All hell broke loose in Washington as House Impeachment Managers decided Saturday to call witnesses in response to late-breaking reports Friday of a contentious conversation on January 6 between then-President Trump and a distraught House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy reportedly begging the unmoved Trump to call off the mob rioting the Capitol.
Ire flew from the lips of Trump defense attorney Michael van der Veen as he reached the podium. Literally stomping on his feet, the noticeable unprepared van der Veen seemed to throw everything against the wall to see what stuck.
“If they want to have witnesses, I’m going to need at least over 100 depositions, not just one. The real issue is incitement,” van der Veen said of the surprise development as prosecutors said they wanted at least one witness, Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, a Republican from Washington state who described the call between McCarthy and Trump. Mark Short, former vice president Pence's chief of staff is another possible important witness under consideration.
The implication being that if there were going to be witnesses that snatched their predicted victory, the Trump team was going to blow up the proceedings and give the House Managers their due.
“After what happened here in this chamber yesterday, the House managers realised they did not investigate this case before bringing the impeachment, they did not give the proper consideration and work, they didn’t put the work in that was necessary to impeach the former president,” said van der Veen in an angry, suprisingly confrontational tone.
Each witness would have to be approved by the senate, and van der Veen seemed to anticipate that by pleading “Do not handcuff me by limiting the number of witnesses that I can have,” and asking for the trial to be concluded today as most of Washington expected. “Don’t, please, in all fairness and in all due process, do not limit my ability to discover, discover, discover the truth. That would be another sham and that’s the president’s position, my position.”
At one point in his passionate ad-lib van der Veen said he would like to depose all those witnesses in his office in Philadelphia, eliciting laughter from the senators in the chamber and propting a call to order.
“There is nothing funny about that,” he complained.
Confusion reigned supreme as the vote to approve the witnesses was held and questions and points of order were called but denied by Senator Patrick Leahy who is presiding over the trial. He made those denials as per the rules of the Senate and those accorded for this trial.
The near-pandemonium that ensued prompted Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to question a quorum, despite all 100 senators being on the floor. The move was procedural in order to buy time to figure out how to organize matters and what steps to take next.
The vote that was taken was to allow the first witness. Each added witness from either side will also need to be approved by senate vote.
The added proceedings add time and room to challenge the factual disputes of Trump defense attorneys who made statements in contrast to statements of witnesses and evidence in their closing pleadings.
The procedure to be followed is likely to begin with private depositions which could then lead to in-person testimony in the Senate or to incorporate portions of their testimony on the record.
Amid news that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnel has said he intended to vote to acquit Trump, the matter is now far from a fait acompli and the prosecution is likely to incorporate more information developed by ongoing investigations and other developments, looking for Republican souls to come to their side. Republicans are saying all the moves will change "zero minds."
It is no time to make a bet on which way this will end.
