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(CNN) - We all saw the House approve the charges of political trial against President Donald Trump. Now there is a very technical legal debate that may be getting out of control.
The basic essence is whether Trump is already charged if the House has not yet handed over the charges of political trial to the Senate. This is an argument of opinion between two Harvard professors - if that tells you how technical it is - but Trump, master of taking advantage of the technicalities and minutiae to question something (remember President Barack Obama's birth certificate) was driving the idea at a rally during the weekend.
"How do you accuse if you have no crime?" Trump said. “Even if people said there was no crime, in fact there is no political trial. His own lawyers said there is no political trial. ”
The “his lawyers” whom Trump refers to are Noah Feldman, the Harvard professor who argued in favor of the political trial at the House's judicial hearings. Feldman argued, as opposed to Harvard professor Laurence Tribe, a legendary Democratic lawyer who did not testify at the hearings, that until the charges are handed over to the Senate, technically there is no political trial.
Is it legitimate?
CNN contributor Scott Gerber writes that there could be something in this if Trump sued the House and argued that the whole process has a political motivation.
“I suspect that many observers believe that the Supreme Court would consider any potential lawsuit that arises from the decision of House President Nancy Pelosi to delay the delivery of charges as a non-justiciable political issue or, in other words, with a If it has such a political burden, federal courts - which are generally seen as the apolitical branch of the State - should not decide the dispute, ”he wrote.
Citing a previous case in which the courts did not interfere in a judge's accusation, Gerber sees an opportunity for the courts to interfere in Trump's.
"If the 'arbitrary' dismissal processes can be reviewed and revoked by the Supreme Court, partisan dismissal processes like those that President Trump continues to submit may also be submitted," he writes. “After all, no Republican member of the House voted to dismiss the president and, despite their claims to the contrary, both President Pelosi and Professor Tribe seem to be motivated by a partisan desire to weaken President Trump during the election cycle. 2020 ”.
Impasse in the Senate
The president of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, has not officially transmitted the charges while trying to pressure the Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell, for concessions on the format for a Senate trial and whether she will have witnesses.
On Twitter, Senator Lindsey Graham, Trump's voice in the Senate, referred to Pelosi's decision as a "constitutional outrage."
McConnell said Monday that he and Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer were at a standstill when negotiating a Senate trial. "We can't do anything until the president sends the papers, so everyone can enjoy the holidays," McConnell told "Fox and Friends."
That means, essentially, that he and Pelosi are playing a procedural game. She will not send the charges until he guarantees justice at the trial. He seems unwilling to negotiate without the charges. Happy Holidays!
Meanwhile, new evidence from Ukraine
Recently published emails show that the official suspension of military aid to Ukraine occurred within 90 minutes of the end of Trump's call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on July 25.
The emails were disclosed as part of a FOIA lawsuit (the Freedom of Information Act, or the Freedom of Information Act) by the Center for Public Integrity. It is the latest information confirming the basic version of the story that Trump withheld money to pressure Zelensky to investigate both the Biden and his conspiracy theory about 2016.
Although emails are very edited, they have some very important points:
- Officials from the Office of Administration and Budget were talking about Trump's specific interest in Ukrainian funds on June 19.
- They specifically withheld help right after the phone call on July 25.
- At that moment they realized that the decision to withhold aid was delicate.
- They asked that the information be "kept confined."
Pentagon officials and the State Department knew Trump's desire to withhold funds on July 18, but the official withholding was made right after the call. This also coincides with the testimony of Laura Cooper, who oversees the Eurasian policy at the Pentagon, that her office received inquiries from both the State Department and the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington about the aid that day.
Does it matter that not all the facts are known?
It is worth noting that at this rate, and partly because the Democrats pressed to quickly accuse Trump, we will still be knowing new details about Trump and Ukraine long after the political trial portion of his presidency has ended.
That said, none of the new evidence has been exculpatory (unless you believe that pressuring Zelensky to harm a political rival is totally fine) and none of them has challenged the basic version.
But there are known facts that the accusers of the House chose not to prosecute.
The courts take forever: it must be taken into account that one of the judicial cases in which the Democrats are trying to obtain the testimony of the former White House lawyer, Don McGahn, precedes the Ukrainian scandal and, apparently, a A decision on whether to appear as a witness could be made after the political trial is conducted. The next court date is January 3.
A second political trial?
In a court presentation, the House of Representatives lawyer Douglas Letter, referring to McGahn's testimony, said that while the accusation is being carried out, investigators must continue their work and investigate the facts. If they discover a new misconduct, he said, a second accusation may be necessary.
“If McGahn's testimony produces new evidence that supports the conclusion that President Trump committed prosecutable crimes that are not covered by the charges approved by the House, the Commission will proceed accordingly, including, if necessary, considering whether to recommend new charges of political judgment, ”says Letter.
The Department of Justice argued that since the political trial charges have been approved, the need for McGahn's testimony is not so urgent.
The vision of a key Democrat of the Red State Senate
Democratic Senator Doug Jones of Alabama won a special election to replace the position vacated by Jeff Sessions when he became Trump's attorney general. He represents a state that strongly supports Trump, and is the Democratic senator at the highest electoral risk by 2020. He is also likely to face next November against no less than Sessions, who is campaigning for his former job after being fired. No ceremonies for Trump for his inhibition of Russia's investigation.
Jones is not against the accusation, but, even after all these months, he wants to see more. He says he can imagine plausible explanations for Trump's behavior.
"I'm trying to see if the dots connect," he said. “If that's the case, then I think it's a serious matter. I think it is a prosecutable matter. But if these points are not connected and there are other explanations that I think are consistent with innocence, I will also go that way. ”
"However, what I really want to see is to fill in the gaps," he said. "There are gaps."
Political judgment
