WASHINGTON — The Senate impeachment trial of President Donald J. Trump marks the first time that U.S. Sens. Richard Blumenthal and Chris Murphy have ever served as jurors.
Neither Connecticut Democrat was in office for a previous Senate impeachment trial, of a president or a judge. And although they’re both lawyers, neither man has been a juror in a court trial, they said this week.
These senators, and so many others, are in new, uncharted territory. Even for those senators who were in office for former President Bill Clinton’s impeachment, the hyperpartisanship, the timing of the trial in an election year and other factors push Trump’s impeachment trial into a realm of its own.
“There is this stark difference between what happened in 1999 and what’s happening now,” said Louis Michael Seidman, a professor at Georgetown Law School. “So I remember the Clinton impeachment very well. Then as now, there was lots of partisan rancor, but I think it’s also fair to say it was not as bad then as it is now.”
All week, Blumenthal and Murphy sat in the Senate chamber from early afternoon to late in the night listening to arguments from the House impeachment managers laying out the case for Trump’s removal from office. On Saturday, they will begin to hear Trump’s lawyers present the case for acquittal.
Next week, after the White House’s case concludes, all senators will have a chance to submit questions to the prosecution and defense. On Friday afternoon, Democrats gathered to plan their questions. Blumenthal said he’s still formulating his. Murphy declined to say what his questions would be.
Like the rest of their party, both Blumenthal and Murphy have made clear that they think the evidence against Trump shows he abused his office and obstructed Congress — the two articles of impeachment, or charges, the House passed against Trump. And like other Democrats, they have been vocal proponents calling for the Senate to gather more evidence against Trump by calling more witnesses and subpoenaing documents.
And even as Democrats beat the drum for evidence, more information has emerged this week supporting the idea that Trump sought politically motivated investigations from Ukraine. A recording of Trump saying in April 2018 that he wanted to remove former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch was published by ABC News on Friday.
Blumenthal and Murphy are firm believers in the detailed narrative that the managers laid out over three days: that Trump tried to use the withholding of U.S. military aid and a meeting at the White House to convince Ukraine to commence two investigations — one into former vice president Joe Biden and his son Hunter, and one into alleged Ukrainian interference in the 2016 U.S. election — that could boost him in the 2020 election campaign.
“This was not a super secret-mystery to unveil,” Murphy said. “They were all being very clear as early as April, May, that they wanted to use American foreign policy for their own corrupt purposes.”
And when Trump was “caught” by a whistle-blower and Congress, Trump and his administration tried to cover up their actions by blocking witnesses and documents sought by lawmakers, the managers said.
This week, Blumenthal and Murphy’s role was mostly listening. They heard the collection of evidence gathered by the House Intelligence and Judiciary committees this fall, laid out in detail.
“Anyone who has sat through the last three days has seen a tableau of a chilling and powerful picture of corrupt abuse of power by Donald Trump for his personal benefit,” Blumenthal said.
Republicans insist that Democrats’ evidence is cherry-picked and that the charges don’t amount to impeachable offenses.
For hours, the senators sat, took notes and drank water. Some dozed off, read books, did crosswords, made paper airplanes or chatted quietly in the back of the room. No cellphones, computers, caffeine or food were allowed in the chamber, although Murphy admitted on Twitter that he accidentally brought his phone in once.
On Tuesday, Murphy and Blumenthal also voted with their party in favor of calling more witnesses and issuing subpoenas for documents to bolster the case.
Democrats say Trump should not be acquitted due to an incomplete record of evidence because the White House prevented House Democrats from accessing that evidence. Most Republicans insist that the evidence-gathering phase of impeachment was the House inquiry; if Democrats wanted to get testimony and documents blocked by the White House, they should have waited for court rulings ordering the evidence to be turned over.
This disagreement was on display when Republicans on Tuesday voted down 11 amendments to the Senate rules governing the trial that would have initiated Senate subpoenas for witnesses and documents. Republicans have said they will consider the question of witnesses and documents after the trial’s opening arguments and after senators ask questions of the prosecution and the defense next week.
But Democrats aren’t holding onto much hope that many Republicans will vote for witnesses and documents later, even if a few moderate Republicans have indicated openness.
“I’m less confident today than I was last week. I feel like the walls are closing in on Republicans,” said Murphy. “I don’t understand it.”
Polling indicates that many Americans believe the trial should include witnesses. Two-thirds of Americans say the U.S. Senate should call new witnesses in the trial, even while the public remains divided over whether Trump should be removed from office, according to a new ABC News/Washington Post poll released Friday.
Would Republicans support calling witnesses they claim would bolster the president’s defense, like former Vice President Joe Biden or his son Hunter Biden, who Trump had asked Ukraine to investigate? Republicans would not need any Democratic votes to bring them to the Senate.
U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisc. on Friday said the Senate needs “to get to the bottom of” Hunter Biden’s work in Ukraine for energy company Burisma. But asked directly if the Senate should call Hunter Biden to testify, he said, “I don’t think we need to hear from any witnesses. I think at some point in time, we need to hear the story.”
A member of Trump’s impeachment team, U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin, R-N.Y., said the best venue for the Senate to examine the Bidens is not the trial, but in the Senate Judiciary Committee. He said he didn’t think Biden’s work in Ukraine was necessary to decide that the articles did not amount to impeachable offenses.
A lawyer for Trump’s defense, Jay Sekulow, confirmed to reporters Friday that discussion of the Bidens will be a part of the defense’s forthcoming arguments.
Regardless of whether witnesses are called, Blumenthal expressed confidence Friday that some day, perhaps soon, the public will know every detail of the Ukraine scandal.
“What we know for certain is all this stuff will come out at some point, it’s just a question of when,” Blumenthal said. “Either through the Freedom of Information Act, or books people write, or interviews they give or simply leaks — we now know who Deep Throat was in Watergate. It has all come out.”
[email protected]; Twitter: @emiliemunson
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