The legal team of Donald Trump has assured Monday that the president is the victim of a partisan plot to dismiss him, and has urged the Senate to acquit him quickly because he did "absolutely nothing wrong."
In a 171-page memo published by the White House on the eve of the start of the Senate trial tomorrow, the lawyers allege that neither accusation - abuse of power and obstruction of Congresses are valid , because they do not establish any specific violation of the law and described them as "deficient", "frivolous and dangerous".
In addition, the memo states that the House's argument - controlled by the Democrats - that Trump obstructed the investigation of the process of political trial in Congress by challenging the citations of witnesses and documents will cause "lasting damage to the separation" of powers.
He also accuses the House Democrats of "corrupting the extraordinary power of political judgment to use it as a political tool with a view to nullifying the outcome of the 2016 elections and interfering with the 2020 elections."
"His fixation for harming the president has trivialized the transcendental act of political judgment, lowered the standards of impeccable behavior and perverted the power of the accusation by making it a partisan political tool during the election year," says the memo.
The president will be represented at the trial by White House lawyers, Pat Cipollone and Jay Sekulow. Ken Starr, Alan Dershowitz, Pam Bondi, Jane Serene Raskin, Eric Herschmann and Robert Ray are also expected to participate.
Democrats reaffirm their accusations
For their part, in a detailed legal report, the political trial managers of the House of Representatives alleged on Saturday that Trump corruptly requested foreign interference in the 2020 elections for his own benefit, pressing Ukraine to announce investigations into his political rivals -Hunter Biden, son of the Democratic candidate Joe Biden- and retaining millions of a package of military aid that the country needed until he made the announcement.
Trump's legal team memo does not dispute that action but claims that it does not amount to abuse of power as it is the president who defines foreign policy and had "legitimate concerns" regarding the relations of Democrats with Ukrainians.
"The invented theory of House Democrats that the president can be accused of taking permissible actions if he does so for what they believe are wrong reasons would also expand the power of political judgment beyond constitutional limits," says the memo .
Trump's lawyers argued that the second accusation article - obstructing Congress by blocking testimony and refusing to hand over documents during the House of Representatives political trial investigation - was "frivolous and dangerous" because it would invalidate the president's right to Confidential deliberations in violation of the separation of powers.
However, a report published last week by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) , an independent, nonpartisan government agency, says the Trump administration did violate the law by withholding $ 391 million in security assistance to Ukraine allocated by Congress, by a decision of the president.
In their response on Monday to the Trump legal team memorandum, Democratic House trial managers reaffirmed the accusations and said that “President Trump did not participate in this corrupt conduct to defend the Presidency or protect the right to vote. He did it to cheat in the next election and bury the evidence when he was caught. ”
They also warned that Trump "will persist in that misconduct, which he considers" perfect, "unless he is removed from office . The Senate should do it after a fair trial. ”
(Edited by Ivette Leyva)