Trump lawyer Michael van der Veen claimed on Friday that the president is not trying to derail the certification of the 2020 election results on January 6.
“The premise of his remarks was that the democratic process would and must take place according to the letter of the law, including the Constitution and the Electoral Act,” Van der Veen said.
But here’s what Trump actually said in his January 6 speech:
“All of us here today do not want to see our election victory stolen by encouraging radical left-wing Democrats. That is what they are doing and being stolen by the fake news media,” Trump said.
He continues: “Our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore, and that’s what it’s about. And to use a favorite term that everyone really came up with, we’ll stop stealing. ‘
Trump later told attendees he would perform with them at the Capitol, where he said it was “up to Congress to confront this serious attack on our democracy.”
Van der Veen claims that Trump is merely advocating for future voting restrictions.
Here’s what Trump said at the end of his speech: ‘Apart from challenging the certification of the election, I call on Congress and the state legislators to carry out rapid and far-reaching electoral reforms, and you must do better before we do not leave any country. ‘
Analysis: What Hillary Clinton Did Not Do
Trump lawyer Michael van der Veen argued that Trump was only doing what Democrats did when Hillary Clinton lost: contesting the results, seeking records and pressure to reject voter certification.
What Hillary Clinton did not do is gather her supporters in Washington, ask them to go to the Capitol, tell them to ‘stop the theft’ and praise them after they stormed the Capitol and chose to kill or otherwise cause damage to elected officials. The reason she did not offer that encouragement is twofold. First, at every turn, she began her concession speech the day after the 2016 election – Trump never gave one – making a point of accepting the rule of law. Second, her supporters did not storm the Capitol or threaten elected officials during a riot at the Capitol.
“I still believe in America and always will. And if you do, we must accept this result and then look to the future. “Donald Trump is going to be our president,” she said on November 9, 2016. Our constitutional democracy entrenches the peaceful transfer of power and we not only respect it – we cherish it. ‘
The point of the executives’ arguments this week was to demonstrate the difference between legal-political discourse and a president urging his supporters to attack Congress and its vice-president.
Attorney Michael van der Veen alleges Trump did not incite violence on January 6
Trump’s defense attorney Michael van der Veen began his team’s opening arguments, declaring that Trump’s speech on Jan. 6 about the White House Ellips was not an incitement to violence.
“No thinking person can seriously believe that the president’s speech on the January 6 ellipse was in any way an incitement to violence or insurgency. This proposal is, on the face of it, extremely absurd,” he told senators.
Van der Veen said Trump had rather encouraged his supporters during his rally “to exercise their rights peacefully and patriotically.” He said the president had outlined a series of legislative steps to be taken, such as approving voter legislation, banning the harvest of ballot papers and requiring proof of citizenship and “becoming strong in the next by-elections.”
“These are not the words of someone who incites a violent uprising,” the lawyer said. “His whole challenge for the outcome of the election was directly focused on how the right civil process could address any problems with the established legal and constitutional system.”
House officials argued that Trump had clearly incited the attack on the Capitol when he told his supporters that they should ‘fight back’.
The trial resumes again
The Senate indictment began just after noon on Friday, with the former president’s legal team presenting his defense.
Michael van der Veen starts with the arguments for the defense. They have up to 16 hours to speak, but the defense team said they would only speak for three to four hours.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, DN.Y., said there would be short breaks about every two hours and a longer dinner break at about 5 p.m.
Broken glass from the doors of Capitol’s Eastern Front to be ‘preserved’
Laura Condeluci, a spokeswoman for the Architect of the Capitol, says the shattered windows in the east front doors, which were repaired Thursday, would be salvaged.
“The broken glass panes that were removed today from the historic Columbus Doors at the eastern entrance to the Rotunda have been preserved,” Condeluci said Thursday in response to a question from NBC News. “The broken windows have been replaced with new glass.”
Asked what they were going to do with the glass, she said: “We are going to look forward to options to display a collection from January 6th.”
Rep. Dean Phillips, D-Mo., Told NBC News that he and rep. Andy Kim, DN.J., today drafted a letter to ‘encourage it to be captured in an exhibition next to the door from which it comes. ”
Phillips said he had informed House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of his letter, and that she ‘looks very acceptable’.
In addition to preserving, they ask that the panels ‘be displayed prominently for future generations to witness the events of that day and the fragility of our democracy.’
In their letter, congressmen cite a number of other examples of ‘impressions of our history’ that can be found around the Capitol, including a bullet hole from the 1954 attack by Puerto Rican nationalists.
“We believe that these items should be preserved as a symbol for those who remain, and to educate future Americans about the fragility of our union and the preciousness of our democracy,” they wrote in their letter.
Sen Whitehouse rejects rhetorical equivalence argument
Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, DR.I., said Friday that he rejects the idea that there is any difference between Trump’s rhetoric before the Jan. 6 attack and the comments of Democratic leaders last year after the death of George Floyd.
Asked about his reaction to the defense’s expected equality argument in an interview with CNN, Whitehouse said: ‘This is false and the obvious differentiation is the events of January 6th. We actually had a mob that was in fact incited and that plundered and looted the place with the aim of disrupting the constitutional process of transfer of power, and did so on behalf of and on behalf of Donald Trump. ‘
“It’s really impossible to compare it to anything else,” Whitehouse continued. ‘There’s a lot of political rhetoric out there. It was different and the prosecution showed it. ‘
Whitehouse said the Trump defense team is trying to keep a good life “and that they can still blow it.”
IDP senators meet with Trump’s legal team to discuss ‘strategy’
Trump’s legal team met with Sens Lindsey Graham, RS.C., Mike Lee, R-Utah and Ted Cruz, R-Texas, on Thursday afternoon after the House executives settled their case.
Graham is seen leaving the meeting and saying, “Until tomorrow.”
Cruz said they “discuss their legal strategy and share our thoughts.”
The meeting raised eyebrows as senators who went to the polls on whether Trump was found guilty also struggled with his legal team. But they are only following in the footsteps of Mitch McConnell, who as the majority leader of the Senate said during Trump’s first indictment that he ‘coordinates with the White House council’.
“There will be no difference between the president’s position and our position on how to deal with it,” McConnell, R-Ky., Said at the time.
Trump’s defense attorney, David Schoen, told reporters after the meeting: “I think this is the best practice here in indictment. There is nothing to this case that has a semblance of the right process.”
Schoen says Trump’s defense arguments can only last 3 to 4 hours
Trump’s attorney, David Schoen, said his team thinks it only takes a few hours to present its arguments against the defense.
According to Schoen’s reporters after the House executives ended their arguments on Thursday, Schoen said Trump’s team could go about three to four hours, something like that, on Friday.
He also criticized the case by the Home Managers, saying that they had turned the evidence into a piece of entertainment, which he said was “horrible”.
Managers expect ‘deflection campaign’ from the Trump defense team, say senior assistants
Senior assistants in the House’s indictment management team told reporters Friday morning that they expect a “diversionary campaign” from Trump’s defense team when the trial begins this afternoon.
“I have no doubt that the defense today will offer very little substantive defense because there is no defense,” an assistant said.
The aides said they expected to hear legal arguments from Trump’s defense team that are ‘extremely dangerous in a constitutional republic’.
They said, for example, that they expected the former president’s lawyers to present the Democrats’ incitement argument against Trump as limited to the one speech he gave on January 6, but the executives made this clear during their two days of speeches. made Trump’s rhetoric about the election hampered the rally by many months.
The assistants also said they expect the defense team to show excerpts from Democrats who, using offensive rhetoric, try to bring about some sort of equivalence. But “like so much of what Trump’s lawyers can say, it’s a gimmick, it’s a salon game meant to incite partisan hostility and play on our division,” they said.