WEBVTT - Trump on Trial (Again) 0:00:00.440 --> 0:00:03.440 The first day of former President Trump's impeachment trial has 0:00:03.520 --> 0:00:06.200 just come to a close, and we are joined here 0:00:06.240 --> 0:00:08.400 by one of the jurors to help us break it 0:00:08.440 --> 0:00:17.800 all down. This is Verdict with Ted Cruz. I think 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:20.840 I've heard it before. I think I've said it before, 0:00:20.920 --> 0:00:23.720 maybe almost exactly a year ago, on the very first 0:00:23.760 --> 0:00:27.720 episode of this show. Is that not word for word, verbatim, 0:00:27.760 --> 0:00:31.800 exactly how Verdict began. It is because, you know, Senator, 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:35.000 it would seem that we are just stuck, suspended in 0:00:35.080 --> 0:00:38.400 mid air in this country. Nothing is changing. I have 0:00:38.440 --> 0:00:41.000 to tell you, when we started this show, it was 0:00:41.040 --> 0:00:45.560 because the first I'm going to start singing, I got you, babe. 0:00:47.040 --> 0:00:49.479 It's just going to keep on and on. When we 0:00:49.520 --> 0:00:53.080 first started, I had no idea really what was at 0:00:53.080 --> 0:00:55.280 play in that first impeachment trial, and that to me 0:00:55.320 --> 0:00:59.960 seems clear cut compared to this second sort of impeachment trial. 0:01:00.000 --> 0:01:03.000 I guess the biggest question on people's minds is is 0:01:03.040 --> 0:01:06.679 this even an impeachment trial? Because obviously Trump is not 0:01:06.680 --> 0:01:09.600 the president anymore. You were there all day, we are 0:01:09.720 --> 0:01:11.679 we are doing exactly what we did a year ago. 0:01:11.760 --> 0:01:14.120 We were here in the middle of the night. You've 0:01:14.200 --> 0:01:16.679 just left the capital. Now, I will say it is 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:20.120 much more humane. So so when we started this last year, 0:01:20.560 --> 0:01:22.280 I think it was two thirty seven in the morning 0:01:22.319 --> 0:01:25.720 when we started this, it's now, what is it, ten 0:01:25.840 --> 0:01:29.920 twelve pm? Much more recent. I you know, that's positively civilized. 0:01:29.959 --> 0:01:32.760 Does that tell you something about the seriousness of this 0:01:32.800 --> 0:01:36.280 impeachment trial? Yes, luck, To be honest, both sides are 0:01:36.319 --> 0:01:40.880 dialing it in. Okay. The end result of this is 0:01:41.400 --> 0:01:48.400 is preordained that this trial, as Shakespeare put it, is 0:01:48.480 --> 0:01:52.440 full of sound and fury signifying nothing. Senator, you know, 0:01:52.560 --> 0:01:55.640 I'm not the most literary guy in the world. I 0:01:55.680 --> 0:01:57.840 thought that was William Faulkner who said that I was. 0:01:58.080 --> 0:02:01.559 I was reading a tweet from Andream Mitchell on NBC. 0:02:02.000 --> 0:02:04.840 She seemed to want to make fun of you and 0:02:05.200 --> 0:02:08.480 attribute that quote to Faulkner. It really was a pretty 0:02:08.560 --> 0:02:12.720 stunning exchange. So this happened a little over an hour ago, 0:02:13.400 --> 0:02:16.400 and I guess Andrew Mitchell decided that she was going 0:02:16.440 --> 0:02:23.760 to upbraid me and demonstrate her intellectual superiority and better learnedness. 0:02:24.440 --> 0:02:31.440 And you know, apparently she does not. Ironically, I didn't 0:02:31.480 --> 0:02:35.400 know this. She has a degree in English literature, American literature. Well, 0:02:35.440 --> 0:02:39.360 that would explain and so and so Faulkner she knows. 0:02:39.440 --> 0:02:43.280 But but but apparently Macbeth she does not know. She 0:02:43.360 --> 0:02:45.600 does not. I think actually there is something in this 0:02:45.639 --> 0:02:48.840 exchange that tells us a lot about the whole impeachment trial, 0:02:48.840 --> 0:02:52.040 which was this this combination not just of ignorance but 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:56.080 also arrogance to correct someone who's using the correct quote. Well, 0:02:56.960 --> 0:02:59.880 life is a tale told by an idiot, full of 0:03:00.120 --> 0:03:04.160 sound and fury signifying nothing. Wow, and one would think 0:03:04.360 --> 0:03:07.880 not only ABC. Jennifer Rubin at Washington Post chimed in, 0:03:08.120 --> 0:03:10.840 agreeing with Andrew Mitchell, it really is kind of amazing 0:03:11.040 --> 0:03:14.400 that between NBC and the Washington Post nobody has actually 0:03:14.480 --> 0:03:17.120 read Macbeth. I'll tell you, Senator, if you spend as 0:03:17.200 --> 0:03:20.200 much time in the media and around journalists as I do, 0:03:20.360 --> 0:03:23.800 not surprising at all, Absolutely not surprising. Well, and you know, 0:03:24.000 --> 0:03:27.480 I will say, nothing is better than when Ernest Hemingway wrote, 0:03:27.560 --> 0:03:29.480 is this a dagger? I see before me the handle 0:03:29.520 --> 0:03:31.480 towards my hand. Come, let me clutch THEE. I have 0:03:31.520 --> 0:03:33.359 THEE not and yet I see THEE still. I thought 0:03:33.360 --> 0:03:36.320 that was JK. Rowling because I don't know. I said, 0:03:36.360 --> 0:03:38.800 we could go through the whole literary canon. You know, 0:03:39.120 --> 0:03:42.720 this does, though, this issue of ignorance and arrogance, It 0:03:42.760 --> 0:03:45.360 does bring me back to the question of the trial, 0:03:45.400 --> 0:03:48.760 because I'll confess to ignorance here. I don't get it. 0:03:48.920 --> 0:03:52.920 I don't know. Is this thing constitutional? Is it unconstitutional? 0:03:53.120 --> 0:03:54.720 Is the Senate have the right to hold the trial? 0:03:54.840 --> 0:03:57.360 Can there be an impeachment trial of an ex president? 0:03:58.000 --> 0:04:00.080 What you were there all day? What's going on? So 0:04:00.360 --> 0:04:03.040 those are really important questions, and we actually address those 0:04:03.080 --> 0:04:06.640 questions yesterday. So the trial itself started today. Yesterday we 0:04:06.720 --> 0:04:10.600 had essentially a pre trial motion, okay, and an argument 0:04:10.640 --> 0:04:14.320 about whether the Senate even has jurisdiction to consider this matter. 0:04:14.920 --> 0:04:17.440 And what's it hard in the argument is is that 0:04:17.560 --> 0:04:20.960 Donald J. Trump is no longer the president. And so 0:04:21.000 --> 0:04:24.640 the argument that the Trump legal campaign made is that 0:04:25.040 --> 0:04:30.440 the Senate doesn't have the jurisdiction to try a former officeholder, right, 0:04:30.800 --> 0:04:34.800 that jurisdiction only extends to current office holders, and once 0:04:34.839 --> 0:04:37.279 he left the White House, the Senate could no longer 0:04:37.279 --> 0:04:40.040 have an impeachment trial. So this has been my understanding 0:04:40.040 --> 0:04:42.119 of it. But you know, I didn't go to law school, 0:04:42.160 --> 0:04:45.520 and I'm no constitutional expert. Well, and you know, it's interesting. 0:04:45.560 --> 0:04:49.080 The constitutional question is actually very close. It is a 0:04:49.120 --> 0:04:52.760 difficult question. It's not a question I had examined until 0:04:53.320 --> 0:04:56.520 till we were faced with it. And I got to say, 0:04:57.800 --> 0:05:01.160 as I looked at it, I actually think the better argument, 0:05:02.120 --> 0:05:05.440 on the substance and on the merits it is that 0:05:05.480 --> 0:05:11.360 the Senate does have the jurisdiction to try a former officeholder. Okay, 0:05:11.400 --> 0:05:15.800 that being said, I don't believe the jurisdiction is mandatory. 0:05:15.839 --> 0:05:17.760 I don't think we have to take it, and so 0:05:17.839 --> 0:05:19.600 I don't think we should take it. Let me walk 0:05:19.600 --> 0:05:21.880 through that, because those are some complicated legal Conscis Wells, 0:05:21.920 --> 0:05:25.599 and I want to point out generally speaking, you've heard 0:05:25.600 --> 0:05:28.640 people it's it's binary. They'll say, either the Senate has 0:05:28.680 --> 0:05:30.640 no jurisdiction here, this is a force of a trial. 0:05:30.960 --> 0:05:34.000 Or the Senate not only has jurisdiction, but we have 0:05:34.040 --> 0:05:36.719 to do it. It's our constitutional responsibility to throw Trump 0:05:36.720 --> 0:05:39.280 in the gulag. And you, as far as I can tell, 0:05:39.320 --> 0:05:42.920 this is a unique legal take. Hey, yeah, it may 0:05:42.960 --> 0:05:46.719 well be. Although actually Mike Lee, by colleague, he and 0:05:46.760 --> 0:05:49.000 I are very close to agreement on this. We've talked 0:05:49.000 --> 0:05:51.359 about this a lot. Mike is a serious legal scholar, 0:05:51.960 --> 0:05:54.800 clerk for Justice Sam Alito on the Supreme Court. Mike 0:05:54.839 --> 0:05:57.359 and I have spent many, many hours talking about this issue, 0:05:57.360 --> 0:05:59.440 and his view and mine are very very close on this. 0:06:00.320 --> 0:06:02.479 Let me start on just the threshold question. Do you 0:06:02.520 --> 0:06:06.200 have jurisdiction? So if you look at the constitutional text, 0:06:07.520 --> 0:06:12.279 you can take arguments from the text on both sides. 0:06:12.720 --> 0:06:15.799 So the Constitution says the House shall have the sole 0:06:15.839 --> 0:06:19.440 power of impeachment and the Senate shall have the sole 0:06:19.520 --> 0:06:23.480 power to try all impeachments. Interestingly, those are the only 0:06:23.480 --> 0:06:26.200 two places in the Constitution you find the word soul power. 0:06:27.000 --> 0:06:31.680 And so it's just impeachments. House is entirely in charge 0:06:31.680 --> 0:06:34.960 of impeachments, the Senate is entirely in charge of trying impeachment. 0:06:35.080 --> 0:06:38.120 Nobody else has power. Right And actually, even on this point, 0:06:38.160 --> 0:06:40.040 I think it's worth clearing up because because we use 0:06:40.120 --> 0:06:43.480 these terms in a loose way, Trump has already been 0:06:43.520 --> 0:06:46.560 impeached shrecked twice, correct, because that the House voted they 0:06:46.560 --> 0:06:49.360 impeached him, he was in office both times. Then there's 0:06:49.360 --> 0:06:52.440 the trial. He's been acquitted once during the first episodes 0:06:52.480 --> 0:06:54.520 of verdict. And now the question is will he be 0:06:54.560 --> 0:06:57.359 acquitted or convicted? And this is one of the things 0:06:57.440 --> 0:07:01.200 most misunderstood just in sort of general Marlans. But to 0:07:01.320 --> 0:07:04.040 be impeached, think of it like in the criminal context, 0:07:04.120 --> 0:07:06.800 to be indicted, like if the grand jury indictes you, 0:07:06.880 --> 0:07:09.640 it means they bring charges against you. If you're indicted 0:07:10.240 --> 0:07:13.920 for running over somebody's dog, doesn't mean you're convicted, it 0:07:13.920 --> 0:07:15.640 means you're charged with it. And then when you have 0:07:15.680 --> 0:07:18.000 a trial, if you're convicted, is when you're found guilty. 0:07:18.480 --> 0:07:21.520 So the House impeaches, which is to bring the charges, 0:07:21.920 --> 0:07:25.600 and the Senate conducts the trial. Now, there are a 0:07:25.600 --> 0:07:29.040 couple of textual arguments that were raised as to why 0:07:29.320 --> 0:07:33.560 former officeholders do not fall into the impeachment power. One 0:07:33.800 --> 0:07:37.160 is that another portion of the Constitution refers to the 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:42.840 president rather than a president, right and Donald J. Trump 0:07:42.920 --> 0:07:45.920 right now is not the president. There's only one the 0:07:46.040 --> 0:07:49.160 president in any moment in history. Today, Joseph Biden is 0:07:49.320 --> 0:07:53.400 the president. Trump is a former president. That's a textual 0:07:53.480 --> 0:07:56.600 argument that is used to say, well, he's not the president, 0:07:56.640 --> 0:08:00.280 so he's not subject to impeachment. What that as it 0:08:00.320 --> 0:08:04.120 actually says, though, is when the president is impeached, the 0:08:04.200 --> 0:08:08.120 Chief Justice shall preside. Because Trump isn't the president, the 0:08:08.160 --> 0:08:12.040 Chief Justice is not presiding. Right. There is another provision 0:08:12.160 --> 0:08:18.680 that says that when the president is impeached and convicted, 0:08:18.720 --> 0:08:21.760 he shall be removed. It uses the word shall. Yeah, 0:08:22.120 --> 0:08:25.120 so the argument is made, well, shall, but he can't 0:08:25.120 --> 0:08:27.679 be If he can't be removed, that means you can't 0:08:28.280 --> 0:08:30.720 remove an X officeholder. Look, that's a real argument. That's 0:08:30.720 --> 0:08:36.720 a substantive argument. On the flip side, As we said, 0:08:36.760 --> 0:08:40.640 he's not the president, he is a former president. If 0:08:40.640 --> 0:08:43.920 you look at the history, as you examine it at 0:08:43.920 --> 0:08:46.360 the time the Constitution was written, it turns out the 0:08:46.440 --> 0:08:50.000 question of what's called late impeachment was actually a topic 0:08:50.040 --> 0:08:53.600 of discussion. Can former officeholders be impeached? If you look 0:08:53.640 --> 0:08:57.840 to British common law, and the Framers were very familiar 0:08:57.880 --> 0:09:00.720 with British common law, and often when you're interpreting US 0:09:00.800 --> 0:09:03.520 constitutional provisions, you look to what where did it come 0:09:03.600 --> 0:09:07.120 from under British law, because many of the concepts the 0:09:07.160 --> 0:09:11.200 Framers took from British law. And there were two very 0:09:11.280 --> 0:09:16.640 notable British impeachments. One was in seventeen twenty five, and 0:09:16.679 --> 0:09:20.720 that was Lord Chancellor Macaelesfield who was impeached for public corruption. 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:24.040 It's very well known impeachment. Now, yeah, I knew all 0:09:24.040 --> 0:09:26.160 about it. I was, you know, I talked about it. 0:09:26.480 --> 0:09:28.120 You know, is there a day you don't talk about 0:09:28.120 --> 0:09:32.920 the Michaelsfield impeachment. Well, Michaelsfield was impeached after he left office. 0:09:34.160 --> 0:09:36.920 A second impeachment was the impeachment of Warren Hastings. Now 0:09:36.920 --> 0:09:40.520 Warren Hastings was the Governor General of India. Interestingly enough, 0:09:40.760 --> 0:09:44.360 his impeachment began in seventeen eighty seven. So literally, while 0:09:44.440 --> 0:09:48.760 the Framers were in Constitution Hall in Philadelphia and in 0:09:48.800 --> 0:09:51.959 the debates of the Constitution, they discuss the impeachment of 0:09:52.000 --> 0:09:58.080 Warren Hastings. Now Hastings likewise was no longer the Governor General, 0:09:58.080 --> 0:10:00.520 and yet nonetheless he was impeaching. By the way, do 0:10:00.520 --> 0:10:02.839 you know who led the charge to impeach Hastings? Who 0:10:03.360 --> 0:10:06.240 someone you're a big fan of? Would this be Edmund 0:10:06.559 --> 0:10:11.120 Edmund Burke, a great considered the founder of modern conservative philosophy. 0:10:11.640 --> 0:10:14.920 Very it's actually very important context for how these Framers 0:10:14.920 --> 0:10:17.520 are thinking about that. So they're literally talking about at 0:10:17.559 --> 0:10:22.160 the Constitutional Convention the impeachment of an out of office officeholder. 0:10:22.200 --> 0:10:24.439 And by the way, right after the founding eighteen oh 0:10:24.520 --> 0:10:29.360 six in Great Britain, Lord Melville was impeached as well, 0:10:29.400 --> 0:10:33.680 so very shortly thereafter. So you've got a fair amount 0:10:33.720 --> 0:10:35.520 of history with British common law, and then you look 0:10:35.559 --> 0:10:43.320 at US history. The first impeachment we have was of 0:10:43.679 --> 0:10:47.719 Senator Blunt of Tennessee, and he was impeached. He was 0:10:47.720 --> 0:10:52.319 actually impeached because he tried to essentially sell Florida and 0:10:52.400 --> 0:10:57.560 Louisiana away from the US, and and he was impeached. 0:10:57.600 --> 0:10:59.800 He was thrown out of the Senate. The guy was crooked. 0:11:00.000 --> 0:11:01.520 This is like when someone says, you know, if you 0:11:01.600 --> 0:11:03.480 believe that I've got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you, 0:11:03.600 --> 0:11:05.760 he tried to sell. He tried to sell a bridge. 0:11:05.800 --> 0:11:13.080 And so there was a big debate during the Blunt impeachment. 0:11:13.160 --> 0:11:17.760 So Blunt was impeached, the House brought charges, the Senate 0:11:17.800 --> 0:11:20.880 expelled him because he was a senator, and then there 0:11:20.920 --> 0:11:23.440 was a big debate on jurisdiction. There were two arguments 0:11:23.440 --> 0:11:27.520 on jurisdiction, One that the Senate couldn't impeach him, because 0:11:27.520 --> 0:11:29.840 he was a senator, and that impeachment didn't apply to 0:11:29.880 --> 0:11:31.840 members of Congress. It only applied to members of the 0:11:31.840 --> 0:11:35.679 executive branch or the judicial branch Okay. And then secondly, 0:11:35.720 --> 0:11:37.840 an argument that was given was he couldn't be impeached 0:11:37.840 --> 0:11:39.720 because he was no longer in office, or he couldn't 0:11:39.720 --> 0:11:43.959 be tried. Rather, the Senate ended up voting by a 0:11:44.040 --> 0:11:47.960 vote of fourteen to eleven that the Senate did not 0:11:48.120 --> 0:11:53.400 have jurisdiction over Blunt Okay. That has both arguments were presented, 0:11:53.440 --> 0:11:58.320 so it's not necessarily conclusive. But the predominant arguments that 0:11:58.360 --> 0:12:00.959 were raised was that he was a enitor, and so 0:12:01.040 --> 0:12:03.360 it was a comment about what kind of job he 0:12:03.400 --> 0:12:07.360 had rather than being a former office holder. One other 0:12:07.400 --> 0:12:11.959 major president eighteen seventy six, Secretary of War, William Belknap, 0:12:12.679 --> 0:12:18.239 now Belknap resigned, was crooked, was caught in corruption, was impeached, 0:12:18.240 --> 0:12:21.520 and the Senate actually had two weeks of debate over 0:12:21.640 --> 0:12:25.320 whether a former officeholder could be impeach because Nap argued, 0:12:25.600 --> 0:12:29.160 I'm out of office, you can't impeach, And the Senate 0:12:29.320 --> 0:12:33.920 ended up voting thirty seven to twenty nine in favor 0:12:34.120 --> 0:12:37.760 of jurisdiction in favor of saying we can try a 0:12:37.840 --> 0:12:42.920 former officeholder. So as I look at this the textual 0:12:43.000 --> 0:12:49.280 language of the Constitution, there's some ambiguity, but the grant 0:12:49.320 --> 0:12:51.760 of power to the Senate is really broad. The Senate 0:12:51.760 --> 0:12:56.240 shall have the sole power to try all impeachments. That's 0:12:56.240 --> 0:13:00.560 a very broad power. Given the history of British common 0:13:00.640 --> 0:13:05.120 law in American history, I think the better constitutional argument is, yes, 0:13:05.200 --> 0:13:07.320 you can try a former officeholder. And let me give 0:13:07.360 --> 0:13:12.040 an example. Imagine we discovered we found evidence that a 0:13:12.080 --> 0:13:18.000 former president had sold American nuclear secrets to the Chinese government. Yea, 0:13:18.960 --> 0:13:24.080 that they were guilty of treason and bribery both, and 0:13:24.120 --> 0:13:26.800 the evidence was conclusive. And by the way, treason and 0:13:26.880 --> 0:13:30.440 bribery are both mentioned explicitly in the Constitution as grounds 0:13:30.440 --> 0:13:34.120 for impeachment. I think in those circumstances, the House would 0:13:34.120 --> 0:13:37.439 conclude overwhelmingly it had jurisdiction to impeach them. The Senate 0:13:37.480 --> 0:13:40.760 would conclude overwhelmingly it had jurisdiction to try them, even 0:13:40.760 --> 0:13:44.480 though they were a former officer. Right, So I concluded. 0:13:44.520 --> 0:13:46.640 I wrote an op ed last night laying out these 0:13:46.720 --> 0:13:49.960 arguments as to why I think the right constitutional argument. 0:13:50.000 --> 0:13:52.720 It's close, but I think the right argument is, yes, 0:13:52.840 --> 0:13:56.440 we have jurisdiction over a former officeholder. I think you've 0:13:56.440 --> 0:14:00.360 actually managed to change my mind on this in this discussion, 0:14:00.360 --> 0:14:02.920 because I was leaning very much text of the Constitution 0:14:03.080 --> 0:14:05.400 certainly made it seem to me as though Senate doesn't 0:14:05.440 --> 0:14:09.480 have jurisdiction. But when you factor in British common law, 0:14:09.520 --> 0:14:11.480 when you factor in these other debates that were happening 0:14:11.520 --> 0:14:15.160 at the time, that is a compelling argument. And yet, 0:14:15.400 --> 0:14:20.000 and yet, so yesterday I voted against jurisdiction. Yes, And 0:14:20.080 --> 0:14:23.640 the reason for that is, generally speaking, there are two 0:14:23.720 --> 0:14:30.119 kinds of jurisdiction, mandatory jurisdiction and discretionary jurisdiction. Okay, Mandatory 0:14:30.200 --> 0:14:33.160 jurisdiction means you must take the case if you have 0:14:33.240 --> 0:14:35.400 the authority to take it. You must take the case 0:14:35.400 --> 0:14:39.240 and you have no choice. Discretionary jurisdiction is you have 0:14:39.320 --> 0:14:42.360 the authority to take the case, but you can choose 0:14:42.560 --> 0:14:45.400 whether or not to hear it. And the easiest example 0:14:45.800 --> 0:14:49.680 is the US Supreme Court. The vast majority of the 0:14:49.760 --> 0:14:53.920 US Supreme Court's docket is discretionary jurisdiction. We heard a 0:14:53.960 --> 0:14:55.760 lot about this during the election. Right, there were these 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:58.080 cases that the Court didn't take. The Court didn't take. 0:14:58.120 --> 0:15:00.080 You were actually slated to argue one of the the 0:15:00.120 --> 0:15:01.600 Court said, no, thank you, we don't want to hear it. 0:15:01.680 --> 0:15:04.440 In any given year, the Supreme Court will get about 0:15:04.560 --> 0:15:07.600 eight thousand what are called petitions for sirtiori, which are 0:15:07.720 --> 0:15:11.680 requests for the Court to exercise its discretionary jurisdiction to 0:15:11.680 --> 0:15:14.600 hear a case. Ye, out of those eight thousand, the court, 0:15:14.680 --> 0:15:16.960 here's about one percent. It here's about eighty out of 0:15:16.960 --> 0:15:20.520 those eight thousand, so seventy nine hundred. It says, go 0:15:20.600 --> 0:15:23.880 jump in a lake. Right, as I look at the Constitution, 0:15:23.920 --> 0:15:26.560 there's nothing in the Constitution that says we have mandatory 0:15:26.640 --> 0:15:31.440 jurisdiction the Senate has to take a case. It says 0:15:31.480 --> 0:15:34.560 the Senate shall have the sole power to try all impeachments. 0:15:34.560 --> 0:15:37.520 It's up to the Senate. The Senate makes those determinations. 0:15:37.560 --> 0:15:39.480 And so what I argued to my colleagues, and actually 0:15:39.480 --> 0:15:41.960 at lunch today, I made this argument to all of 0:15:41.960 --> 0:15:44.400 my colleagues that, for what it's worth, here's my thinking 0:15:45.120 --> 0:15:49.480 that in this case, we should not exercise jurisdiction. We 0:15:49.560 --> 0:15:52.000 shouldn't take up the case and the reasons we shouldn't 0:15:52.040 --> 0:15:55.480 take it up. Our number one, the House had zero 0:15:55.600 --> 0:15:58.840 due process. Yeah, they considered it for seven days. They 0:15:58.840 --> 0:16:01.720 heard no witnesses, they held they held no hearings, they 0:16:01.800 --> 0:16:05.240 examined no evidence. This was a political impeachment. It seems 0:16:05.240 --> 0:16:07.760 as though they're sort of changing their arguments. Maybe we'll 0:16:07.800 --> 0:16:09.960 get into that a little bit on just what happened today. Yeah, 0:16:10.000 --> 0:16:13.040 but yeah, it just it seems it seemed like a 0:16:13.080 --> 0:16:15.640 shallow process in the House. And I don't think the 0:16:15.720 --> 0:16:18.840 Senate is obliged. Look this precedent. You know, this has 0:16:18.840 --> 0:16:21.720 also been called a snap impeachment, where they just vote 0:16:21.720 --> 0:16:24.000 out an impeachment because we hate the guy. I don't 0:16:24.040 --> 0:16:28.000 think the Senate has any obligation if the House engages 0:16:28.040 --> 0:16:31.640 in a sham proceeding to conduct a full trial. I 0:16:31.680 --> 0:16:34.400 think we are perfectly justified in saying we are declining 0:16:34.440 --> 0:16:38.440 to exercise jurisdiction over this because it doesn't meet the 0:16:38.480 --> 0:16:43.520 threshold of a credible, real serious impeachment right. Secondly, on 0:16:43.560 --> 0:16:49.240 the merits, I think there is no serious argument that 0:16:49.280 --> 0:16:54.320 this meets the legal threshold for impeachment. There's only one 0:16:54.360 --> 0:16:59.760 count that the House alleges, which is incitement insurrection, incitement 0:16:59.760 --> 0:17:04.879 to to riot and violence. Now there clearly was riot. 0:17:04.920 --> 0:17:07.320 There was a terrorist attack on the Capitol. It was horrific, 0:17:07.720 --> 0:17:10.560 and you know today, so we went through eight hours 0:17:10.600 --> 0:17:14.800 of the House Manager's arguments and they did an effective job. 0:17:14.880 --> 0:17:19.199 Let me start by saying that they look Democrats have 0:17:19.240 --> 0:17:23.640 a lot of trial lawyers, and they had some trial 0:17:23.720 --> 0:17:27.960 lawyers today that were good storytellers who were emotional. I mean, 0:17:28.000 --> 0:17:31.800 they got up, they walked through, they were well organized, 0:17:31.840 --> 0:17:36.159 and it was We watched a lot of videos today. 0:17:36.320 --> 0:17:40.200 They seemed to rely a lot on these very charged 0:17:40.320 --> 0:17:43.440 videos that drove evoke a lot of emotions, and it 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:45.680 was powerful. It was horrified. I mean there were a 0:17:45.720 --> 0:17:47.399 lot of moments in the Senate where you could hear 0:17:47.400 --> 0:17:50.760 a pin drop because you're watching this and it's horrific. 0:17:50.760 --> 0:17:57.439 It's horrific seeing violent criminals and terrorists assaulting, beating police officers, 0:17:59.040 --> 0:18:04.720 loudly proclaimed their desire to carry out murder and succeeding 0:18:04.720 --> 0:18:08.159 in murdering one police officer and injuring over a hundred. 0:18:08.160 --> 0:18:11.680 I mean, it was all of us, and I think 0:18:11.680 --> 0:18:15.320 all of the country who watched today was horrified. At 0:18:15.320 --> 0:18:19.760 what happened, and that this was a grotesque terrorist attack 0:18:20.880 --> 0:18:23.840 carried out by violent criminals who should be fully prosecuted 0:18:23.840 --> 0:18:26.439 and spend a long, long time in jail, I think 0:18:26.560 --> 0:18:30.760 is unequivocal. Sure, but the emotional effect of the videos 0:18:30.800 --> 0:18:33.639 and even the stories that these impeachment managers were saying, 0:18:33.920 --> 0:18:36.840 it's not the same thing as an argument that the 0:18:36.880 --> 0:18:41.240 president committed an impeachable offense. Well, and ninety plus percent 0:18:41.280 --> 0:18:44.240 of the time of the house managers today was on 0:18:44.280 --> 0:18:48.320 how horrific the attack was and if we were impeaching 0:18:48.359 --> 0:18:51.440 you know, the guy with Viking horns that were beating 0:18:51.480 --> 0:18:54.240 people up, Sign me up? Where do I vote? Right? 0:18:54.720 --> 0:18:57.480 But at the end of the day, incitement. The standard 0:18:57.560 --> 0:19:01.119 for incitement is it has to be a very direct 0:19:01.280 --> 0:19:04.199 call for violence. And if you look at what the 0:19:04.240 --> 0:19:09.040 president said the president and listen the president's rhetoric at times, 0:19:09.119 --> 0:19:11.600 I think is overheated. I wish some of the things 0:19:11.640 --> 0:19:13.280 he says, some of the things he tweeted, I wish 0:19:13.280 --> 0:19:15.919 he didn't say and tweet. But if you look at 0:19:15.960 --> 0:19:19.440 what he actually said at the speech on January sixth, 0:19:20.160 --> 0:19:22.240 the Democrats are making a big deal of well, he 0:19:22.320 --> 0:19:25.760 kept saying fight. You need to fight, like hell yeah. 0:19:26.440 --> 0:19:29.280 Let me tell you. If we take every person who 0:19:29.320 --> 0:19:31.240 has ever said you gotta fight, you gotta fight like 0:19:31.320 --> 0:19:33.920 how you gotta win, We gotta take our country back, 0:19:34.800 --> 0:19:39.480 you would literally be prosecuting every single political candidate in 0:19:39.520 --> 0:19:43.919 America for incitement. Like I guarantee you of all the 0:19:44.080 --> 0:19:46.920 all fifty Democratic senators, every single one, and if you've 0:19:46.960 --> 0:19:49.680 ever given a stump speech, if you ran for seventh 0:19:49.680 --> 0:19:52.399 grade class, President, I'm willing. I'm willing to Batmichael. You 0:19:52.400 --> 0:19:54.480 stood up and said we gotta fight. Yes, I did, 0:19:54.480 --> 0:19:57.600 and I won my race. Darn it there, because it's 0:19:57.640 --> 0:20:03.280 effective political rhetoric and everybody does. It is ubiquitous. It 0:20:04.359 --> 0:20:09.360 is commonplace language to say fight. In this case, President 0:20:09.400 --> 0:20:13.119 Trump said peacefully. He explicitly said peacefully. It was not 0:20:13.119 --> 0:20:17.520 a call to violence. And where the House Manager's argument 0:20:17.600 --> 0:20:21.960 falls apart is whatever standard. They haven't really articulated a 0:20:22.000 --> 0:20:24.280 standard for incitement. Maybe they'll do that tomorrow, but they 0:20:24.280 --> 0:20:28.600 haven't even tried to say, this is how you distinguish 0:20:28.880 --> 0:20:33.280 ordinary political speech or even hot rhetoric, I mean, from 0:20:34.920 --> 0:20:42.560 truly criminal incitement. Any standard they would articulate right after 0:20:42.600 --> 0:20:45.760 this trial, we better start moving forward against Nancy Pelosi, 0:20:46.400 --> 0:20:51.159 at Maxine Waters and Chuck Schumer, Hillary Clinton for them, 0:20:51.320 --> 0:20:55.560 Hillary Clinton, Kamala harrisy Booker. Look you look at Nancy 0:20:55.560 --> 0:20:59.960 Pelosi called police officers Nazis. Yeah, there's some rich irony. 0:21:00.080 --> 0:21:02.679 Now all these Democrats are defending police officers given a 0:21:02.760 --> 0:21:06.800 year of vilifying cops and saying abolish the police and 0:21:07.640 --> 0:21:11.320 acab their motto, all cops are bastards is what that 0:21:11.359 --> 0:21:14.720 stands for. And these are now the defenders of law enforcement. 0:21:14.760 --> 0:21:20.359 I mean it. You know, if God were still in 0:21:20.400 --> 0:21:23.520 the business of throwing lightning bolts, some Democrats might have 0:21:23.520 --> 0:21:30.680 been struck down. Right. You look at Chuck Schumer who 0:21:30.680 --> 0:21:33.240 went to the steps of the Supreme Court, called out 0:21:33.280 --> 0:21:36.639 two Supreme Court justices by name and says, you have 0:21:36.800 --> 0:21:39.760 unleashed the whirlwind and you will pay the price. He 0:21:39.840 --> 0:21:45.360 threatened them directly. Now look that if what Trump said 0:21:45.400 --> 0:21:48.040 is incitement, what Schumer said is inside. Well. Maxine Waters 0:21:48.040 --> 0:21:51.240 said when you see Republicans in public, go up, get 0:21:51.280 --> 0:21:56.719 in their face, or started confrontation, she explicitly urged violence. 0:21:57.000 --> 0:22:02.600 And I'll tell you Kamala Harris, who the media is 0:22:02.680 --> 0:22:08.200 right now in the midst of beatifying Kamala Harris when 0:22:08.240 --> 0:22:11.399 we had violent riots, and we had for a year 0:22:11.560 --> 0:22:15.679 riots across this country. City's being burned, mostly peaceful police cars. 0:22:16.000 --> 0:22:19.840 CNN apologizing for him, like crazy police cars being firebomb 0:22:19.880 --> 0:22:24.040 police officers being murdered, and these Democrats who are now 0:22:24.280 --> 0:22:30.400 high and mighty, we're apologizing for celebrating, encouraging Kamala Harris 0:22:31.119 --> 0:22:36.320 raised bail money, yeah, to bail out not the peaceful protesters, 0:22:36.600 --> 0:22:39.040 the violent criminals. So it was literally after they had 0:22:39.040 --> 0:22:42.120 committed acts of violence, she was raising money to bail 0:22:42.200 --> 0:22:47.760 them out. Now, the truthful matter, the truthful assessment of 0:22:47.800 --> 0:22:51.399 it is none of this is incitement. But there is 0:22:51.560 --> 0:22:55.359 no coherent standard that says what Trump said his incitement 0:22:55.680 --> 0:23:00.040 and what Kamalin Schumer said is not. You can't have it. 0:23:00.440 --> 0:23:02.920 You can't have The only people guilty are the ones 0:23:02.920 --> 0:23:05.680 politically I dislike. And that's really what the Democrats are. 0:23:05.960 --> 0:23:08.000 This is the issue because I don't think any Republicans 0:23:08.000 --> 0:23:11.000 out there are really saying we need to kick Corey 0:23:11.040 --> 0:23:12.879 book or out of the center because you know, he 0:23:12.960 --> 0:23:15.560 said something one time, but they're actually believe in free speech. 0:23:16.320 --> 0:23:20.080 Even don't speech you have a right right to it. 0:23:20.440 --> 0:23:24.000 But if we're going to take this unprecedented action impeach 0:23:24.480 --> 0:23:28.040 a former president now a private citizen in Florida for 0:23:28.359 --> 0:23:31.240 this language where he said maybe it was overblown at times, 0:23:31.240 --> 0:23:32.920 but he did say at the moment, be peaceful, don't 0:23:32.960 --> 0:23:34.600 be violent. If we're going to do that, why on 0:23:34.640 --> 0:23:37.040 earth are we letting Nancy Pelosi off the hook? Hillary Clinton, 0:23:37.080 --> 0:23:40.320 Maximars all these people. Because this is not a legal argument, 0:23:40.440 --> 0:23:43.480 it's not a constitutional argument, and it's not a principled argument. 0:23:43.800 --> 0:23:47.640 There's a reason why ninety percent of what they did 0:23:47.680 --> 0:23:50.199 today was emotional. It was just designed to have you go, 0:23:50.280 --> 0:23:53.600 oh my god, this was horrible. Yeah, and it was horrible. 0:23:53.680 --> 0:23:56.760 It was a terrorist attack. Now there is a difference, 0:23:56.960 --> 0:23:59.639 which is that you and I and most people on 0:23:59.680 --> 0:24:04.520 the right unequivocally condemned this violence. It's bad. And let 0:24:04.560 --> 0:24:09.400