House Intelligence Committee Chairman and impeachment manager Adam Schiff (D-CA) made the argument that the Senate should call witnesses, that not doing so would be "kicking the can down the road." The reality is the House had the ability to subpoena witnesses but they decided to ram their impeachment case through instead of gathering as much evidence as possible.
The House wanted to hear from former National Security Advisor John Bolton, Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, Senior Adviser to the acting White House Chief of Staff Robert Blair and Office of Management and Budget official Michael Duffey. President Trump invoked executive privilege, which is well within his right. Instead of waiting for the courts to decide whether or not executive privilege applies to these officials, the House pushed full-steam ahead. The Democrats have continually claimed that Trump "obstructed justice" by invoking executive privilege, and it's something President Trump's defense team member Jay Sekulow completely threw back in Schiff's face.
"Sen. Schumer said earlier today that the eyes of the founders are on these proceedings. Indeed that is true. But at the heart of the Constitution that governs these proceedings and what we just heard from manager Schiff... courts have no role, privileges don't apply, what happened in the past, we should just ignore," Sekulow said.
"In fact, manager Schiff just said, 'Try to summarize my colleagues' defense of the president.' He said it, not in those words, of course, which is not the first time Mr. Schiff has put words into transcripts that did not exist," Sekulow said, referencing Schiff's prior rewriting of the call transcript between President Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
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"Mr. Schiff also talked about a trifecta. I'll give you a trifecta. During the proceedings that took place before the Judiciary Committee, the president was denied the right to cross-examine witnesses. The president was denied the right to access evidence. And the president was denied the right to have counsel present at hearings. That's a trifecta, a trifecta that violates the Constitution of the United States."
If the Democrats were truly interested in getting the facts and hearing from witnesses, they would have slowed down and waited for the court to decide whether or not executive privilege was applicable. They're moving the goalposts and denying Trump the right to due process.
.@JaySekulow: Schiff's trifecta violates the Constitution
— Team Trump (Text FIRST to 88022) (@TeamTrump) January 21, 2020
President @realDonaldTrump was denied the right to:
1?Cross examine witnesses
2?Access evidence
3?Have counsel present at hearings pic.twitter.com/kBBaXIFMyA
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