Day One Of Trump’s Impeachment Trial Was A Complete Mess

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February 10, 2021, 7:51 am

The difference in quality between the House manager’s presentation on the opening day of former president Trump’s impeachment trial and that of Trump’s own lawyers was not only vast but embarrassing.

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While Rep. Jamie Raskin gave an emotional account of the Capitol riots that he and others want Trump held responsible for inciting, Trump’s own lawyers, David Schoen and Bruce Castor, didn’t quite manage the same impact.

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According to people familiar with the plan, the two switched places shortly before going in front of the Senate. But while that may partly account for Castor’s rambling and incoherent speech, it’s hard to imagine he had something more convincing up his sleeve had they stuck to their original plan.

As it stood, Castor spent his time praising Raskin for presenting a convincing case, telling the Senate that actually Trump did lose the election, and launching into an irrelevant sidetrack explaining what “records” (yes, as in, vinyl) are.

The whole thing was so bad that The Washington Post actually compiled some of his “strangest” statements:

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Trump himself was reportedly livid over how poorly Castor handled day one, despite the fact that the majority of Republicans still voted to skip the trial after listening to him fail to prove his point.

But six Republicans voted for the trial to continue. Five were expected to do so, but Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy admitted he was so put off by how poorly Castor and Schoen did their jobs that he went with the more convincing argument.

“President Trump’s team were disorganized. They did everything they could but to talk about the question at hand, and when they talked about it, they kind of glided over it, almost as if they were embarrassed of their arguments,” he said.

Cassidy repeatedly referred to himself as an impartial juror, insisting he doesn’t know how he’ll vote at the end of the trial. 

He also responded to a reporter who had the gall to ask why he thought Trump’s team did a “terrible job” with an incredulous “Did you listen to it? Then it speaks for itself.”

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As BuzzFeed News pointed out, Cassidy had originally deemed the trial unconstitutional but reversed his position because Trump’s legal team did such a bad job.

Castor received a lot of flack online for his questionable approach to the trial, generally coming across as inept to people on both sides of the political aisle. And if you’re the lawyer following Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and Lin Wood in fighting for Trump and still look this bad…well, in Cassidy’s words: “it speaks for itself.”

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*First Published: February 10, 2021, 7:51 am

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