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Trump’s Lawyer Previews Defense Strategy, Says Will Use Videos of Democrats During Trial

Trump’s Lawyer Previews Defense Strategy, Says Will Use Videos of Democrats During Trial

“I think you can count on that,” Bruce Castor said when asked if he’d use videos of Democrats like Maxine Waters during the trial. “If my eyes look a little red to the viewers, it’s because I’ve been looking at a lot of video.”

https://twitter.com/IngrahamAngle/status/1358027868517900289

Last week, President Trump announced a new team of lawyers who would be presenting his defense during the Senate’s impeachment trial, which is scheduled to begin later this week.

In a statement released to the media, David Schoen and Bruce L. Castor Jr. were named as his attorneys in the trial. Castor, who is the lead attorney, is a former Solicitor General for Pennsylvania. Schoen, a civil rights lawyer and criminal defense attorney, has been practicing law for over three decades. Schoen is also one of the lawyers who represented Roger Stone.

The team filed a legal brief on Tuesday that gave a glimpse into what their case will look like once the trial starts on Tuesday. Their primary argument will be that the Senate trial is unconstitutional because Trump is no longer in office. Further, they will argue that Trump’s speech did not incite the Capitol rioters and that he had a First Amendment right to say what he did:

The crux of Trump’s legal argument is that the trial is unconstitutional — a “legal nullity,” his attorneys write — because he is no longer a sitting president.

[…]

In their brief filed Tuesday afternoon, Trump’s attorneys deny that Trump was “factually in error” when he claimed on Jan. 6 that he had won the election by a landslide.

“It is admitted that President Trump addressed a crowd at the Capitol ellipse on January 6, 2021 as is his right under the First Amendment to the Constitution and expressed his opinion that the election results were suspect, as is contained in the full recording of the speech,” Trump’s lawyers write.

Part of the Democrats’ case against Trump reportedly will involve airing video footage at the trial, including video of his January 6th speech as well as videos of the Capitol building being breached.

In response to that, Castor stated on Laura Ingraham’s show Friday that Trump’s defense would also be airing videos, except his clips would be of Democrats who either encouraged the Antifa/BLM-led riots from last year or who urged their supporters to harass Trump officials during the course of his time in office. His point is that Democrats are traveling down a dangerous path with the “incitement” charge considering what they’ve said over the last four years:

“Will you then respond with Maxine Waters, a number of other Democrat officials not speaking out about the Antifa and other extremist rallies over the last summer?” Ingraham asked.

“I think you can count on that,” Castor said. “If my eyes look a little red to the viewers, it’s because I’ve been looking at a lot of video.”

Earlier in the segment with Ingraham, Castor alleged “there’s a lot of tape of cities burning and courthouses being attacked and federal agents being assaulted by rioters in the streets, cheered on by Democrats throughout the country,” seemingly referring to ongoing unrest in Portland, Ore.

Watch:

In other words, if Democrats want to turn the trial into political theater – and they will, Castor is prepared to play that game, too.

This is sure to enrage Democrats, who don’t like to be reminded of their past statements in support of riots and/or confronting Trump officials – especially when those reminders are aired on national TV. Trump’s attorneys are also expected to bring up the fact that Democrats including the House’s lead impeachment manager Jamie Raskin have objected to certifying electoral votes in presidential elections where Republicans have won, which should further incense Democrats who want people to believe that doing such a thing is undemocratic, unprecedented and unconstitutional.

Understandably, Trump’s team is not revealing the totality of their case before the trial, but one has to wonder if they’ll bring up the fact that it’s become increasingly clear that the Capitol riots were a preplanned affair, which refutes the Democrats’ central argument that Trump’s January 6th speech caused the riots.

Whatever the case may be, expect the high drama and fireworks to start early on. It wouldn’t be Washington, D.C. if the trial started any other way.

— Stacey Matthews has also written under the pseudonym “Sister Toldjah” and can be reached via Twitter. —

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Comments

JusticeDelivered | February 7, 2021 at 12:27 pm

It sounds to me like Dem zeal is going to have unintended consequences, on a grand scale.

The Friendly Grizzly | February 7, 2021 at 12:30 pm

This should prove interesting. I noted in the article above it says Democrats will be in raged. Aren’t they always?

Now that the Capitol is fenced in…cutting power and communication could give the country a sense of peace and sanity it has long needed. It could make “lawlessness” have a new meaning.

How do you fight a rigged trial?

    Milhouse in reply to MarkSmith. | February 7, 2021 at 3:00 pm

    How is it rigged? If you mean the outcome is known in advance, yes, it is — we know Trump will be acquitted. We know there will not be 17 Republican votes to convict him. Are you complaining about that?!

      Subotai Bahadur in reply to Milhouse. | February 7, 2021 at 4:06 pm

      My guess as to MarkSmith’s meaning is that the course of the trial is rigged with no real defense being allowed to be presented. Leahy will be taking the role of Volksgerichtshof Praesident Roland Freisler.

      As far as the number of Republican Senators who will vote for conviction, the Republican Party has been working very hard of late to chase off any Deplorable supporters. A larger number of turncoats would probably do it effectively.

      Expecting the law, the Constitution, or political sense to prevail in this country is perhaps not the most accurate forecast anymore.

      YMMV

      Subotai Bahadur

Perhaps the fracturing Dem Party will rupture and the oldest, most feeble, with their lost inhibition mechanisms will be sacrificed. … How will the geriatric sociopaths defend themselves: state that they forgot to take their dementia meds and SSRIs or their opioids for muscle pains when they made their statements “inciting insurrection” ? … And, how will Kamala respond to the fact that she was funding bail for the “peaceful rioters” ?

Don’t forget Harris with Cobert
“This is a movement, I’m telling you.  They’re not going to stop. And everyone beware because they’re not going to stop. They’re not going to stop before Election Day in November, and they’re not going to stop after Election Day. And that should be — everyone should take note of that, on both levels, that they’re not going to let up, and they should not, and we should not.”

What’s the fucking point? These fucks have already found Trump guilty. Nothing said from Tuesday onwards will change anything.

Also I see Gropey 10% China Joe was on TV last week saying Trump will not have access to intelligence briefings, thus becoming the first President cut off in such a manner.

A couple points on this, firstly I doubt Trump would have been interested in these fantasy briefs to begin with and second it’s interesting that the one guy who would actually never sell out his country is being cut off by the other guy who is owned by China.

Fuck. Them. All.

    MarkS in reply to mailman. | February 7, 2021 at 2:50 pm

    Dems are trying to convince themselves that Trump was never president

    Milhouse in reply to mailman. | February 7, 2021 at 3:03 pm

    The audience is, first of all, the public, and second, the handful of Republicans who are on the fence. No Democrat will vote for acquittal, and no more than 4-5 Republicans will vote for conviction, but that number can be brought down to 1-2.

He can use the Time article as evidence.

“seemingly referring to ongoing unrest in Portland, Ore.”

That lie is from the Politico article.

    Milhouse in reply to Rabel. | February 7, 2021 at 3:04 pm

    How is it a lie? Where else have they been burning courthouses and assaulting federal agents?

      Sanddog in reply to Milhouse. | February 7, 2021 at 4:45 pm

      DC. Not the courthouse burning but they have caused damage and attacked feds.

        Gosh, BLM/Antifa burns one little church, a few government buildings, loots a wide swath of D.C. with just a few minor deaths here and there, and everybody politely covers their eyes and chants “Mostly peaceful protesters”

CaliforniaJimbo | February 7, 2021 at 1:29 pm

It’s a given that if the Dems are being owned by the president’s lawyers, Leaky Leahy will cut them off accordingly

    TY… This is exactly what concerns me. Why would that asshat allow any of the real good stuff to be presented? They don’t care about the constitution, and they will not care to even appear to be fair or impartial. Why bother?

      This defense strategy (specifically the early announcement of this part of their defense; itself a defense strategy) is already bearing fruit in that Maxine Waters is already walking back her incitement of mobs to harass any Trump admin employee/appointee/whatever spotted by rabid leftist mobs in public.

      The point is not the viewing of the video during the trial (it may well not be allowed, as the defense team clearly understands) but it is the hype now that will make people seek it out. The strategy is already causing Dems to back-peddle on their own “inciting” rhetoric because more people will see it now online than will even tune in to the actual impeachment trial.

      Public, especially political, trials are about a lot more than what does or does not happen in the courtroom (in this case the Senate).

      Ultimately, no matter what happens in the trial, Trump will not be convicted. Again. This is all just political theater, and it’s already biting Democrats. Again.

      Don’t despair. Enjoy the show.

        It’s a brush-back pitch. All of the House impeachment managers have a long video history which can be clipped and presented during the inquisition… um, I mean trial. They *know* they’ve said things far worse than Trump did during his speech. So when they’re putting together their own slanted presentation of the Trump speech, they’re not going to be quite so enthusiastic about their clips, probably slanting them less to his words and more to the actual attack on the building.

        If done correctly, the defense can keep the persecution… I mean prosecution from presenting any snippets of the speech, which lets them put that particular golf club back into the bag and focus on actual facts.

        Expect the defense to demand that Trump’s full speech be played in its entirety, and the House managers to break down in frothing fits of rage at the demand.

I will be curious to see whether the mainstream media black out the segments of the defense that show people like Maxine Waters exhorting her followers to harass Trump Administration officials, Antifa riots, Seattle lawlessness, CNN “mostly peaceful” descriptions of cities burning, and Kamala Harris’s “this will continue” proclamation.

I did a google search of Democrats who have used the phrase “fight like hell” in their speeches. It’s an amazing list: Liz Warren actually used it as a promo line. But also: Sanders, AOC, Ilhan Omar, Julian Castro, Beto O’Rourke. The list goes on.

Anyone worth their salt would compile a mash-up video of every one of them using that phrase – over and over.

Bucky Barkingham | February 7, 2021 at 3:06 pm

The presiding officer, Capt Kangaroo er Sen Leahy, will not allow it. Only video supporting the phony article of impeachment will be allowed.

Remember Ashli Babbitt

    If they disallow any form of due process for the President’s team, they along with every single Republican need to leave the chamber and declare the trial illegal and illegitimate. Stop playing the game they way they chose to run it.

      Yes in theory, no in practice. First, I don’t believe they are *permitted* to leave the Senate during the hours of the trial. Second, the impeachment vote is 2/3 of all Senators *present* so marching off just lets them ram through a vote and declare victory.

I hope they insert those ten seconds of Biden at the debates claiming that Antifa wasn’t an organization, but an idea.

The truth means nothing. Remember: we live under a ruling Junta put in power by way of a coup.

We’ve got to get the hell out – and take what is ours with us.

They should also show lots of video of Antifa-BLM rioting, looting, arson, and violence. Include stats about the estimated property damage, number of cops hospitalized, number of people who died, etc.

Also, throw in some video of Anitifa-BLM thugs trying to ‘storm’ the WH last summer. And the Federal courthouse in Portland.

Add some video of Dem’s inciting mobs to assault SCOTUS Chambers. Where they were pounding on the doors of SCOTUS’ Chambers.

To finish things off, talk a bit about Bernie Bro Hodgkinson trying to murder a dozen or more GOP Reps.

    B__2 in reply to JHogan. | February 8, 2021 at 1:31 am

    I am not a lawyer, so I may have missed some important points of law. The following is from my understanding of law.

    If this was a normal judicial trial, evidence from both sides would be presented to the other side and they would have an opportunity to refute or answer that evidence in the discovery phase before it is brought into court. Evidence without relevance would be disallowed by a judge and not allowed to be presented in court. Arguing that other persons also were breaking the law is probably not relevant as an argument for innocence unless it can be shown that this law has been regularly not enforced by the police and judiciary, or that there was entrapment involved.

    Even if the defence had numerous examples of Democrat politicians calling for explicit violence and their meeting with violent anti-Trump groups, the prosecution would probably argue that these Democrats are not on trial and so such assertions be excluded as they have no bearing on Trump’s guilt. If it was allowed as evidence, they would argue that a single Democrat politician’s actions are not the same as if the President did the same, and are thus irrelevant and not presentable in court. They would strongly argue that these Democrat politicians are not on trial and so this evidence should be disallowed in Trump’s trial.

    If the prosecution’s argument is that Trump said has secret words or gestures that are understood to be a secret code for planning for group violence and direct calls for this violence then they should provide a high standard of proof of what these supposedly these ‘dog whistle’ words and gesture mean and how many Trump supporters know and understand this secret language. Trump’s defence should demand proof of the exact words that apparently have such hidden meanings and proof of how exactly his supporters recognise these hidden meanings as specific calls for actual imminent violence.

    Unfortunately this is not a normal trial and apparently normal laws of evidence and procedure are likely to be ignored.

Expect the media to cut away whenever Trump or his lawyers are speaking. Have to protect the public from Trump’s “baseless claims” and “disinformation”.