Ex-President Donald Trump is not prepared for his Senate impeachment trial despite the fact that it could begin as early as next week.
Trump, who is charged with inciting the deadly Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol by a mob of his supporters, still has not assembled a group of lawyers to defend him at what will be his second impeachment trial, NBC News reported.
He also has no clear legal strategy for the trial, according to NBC. Democratic senators, and likely a number of Republican ones, hope to convict Trump and then vote to bar him from becoming president ever again.
The failure to prepare for the trial is consistent with Trump’s behavior this month, where he did little actual work related to the presidency.
Trump currently is staying at his Mar-a-Lago resort in south Florida, where he traveled Wednesday after refusing to attend the inauguration of Joe Biden as president.
Rudy Giuliani, Trump’s personal lawyer, said Sunday that he will not represent him at the trial because he gave a speech at the same rally where Trump spoke just before the riot.
Giuliani had called for “trial by combat” at that rally, encouraging Trump supporters to pressure Congress to reverse Biden’s electoral victory.
The former New York City mayor and federal prosecutor told ABC News he was a “witness,” which precluded him from acting as Trump’s defender in the trial.
Senate Democratic leaders as of Thursday morning said that they did not know when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., will send them the article of impeachment passed last week by the House. Ten GOP House members joined all Democratic members in approving the impeachment.
With the impeachment article still in Pelosi’s hands, the Senate trial will not begin until Monday at the earliest.
Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin, D-Ill., told an NBC reporter on Thursday that it is also not clear whether the trial will be “a full-blown trial with evidence and witnesses,” or a quicker trial without either of those.
Durbin noted that calling witnesses may not be necessary because “in addition to being jurists we are eyewitnesses to this crime.”
“You know, it isn’t like, oh, did somebody come into the Capitol,” Durbin said. “We know the Capitol policeman was killed, and we saw the damage that was done.”
“In that respect, it isn’t like what in the hell was going on in that telephone conversation with the Ukrainian president?” said Durbin, referring to Trump’s first Senate trial.
Trump was acquitted in his first impeachment trial, despite the fact that he had pressured Ukraine’s leader to investigate the Biden family at the same time he was withholding military aid from the country.
Democrats had blasted Republicans at the first trial for refusing to allow witnesses.
Durbin added, “we’ve seen the videos” of the riot, many of which were posted online by Trump supporters who were part of the mob.
When asked whether Trump’s lack of lawyers for the trial could delay the proceeding, Durbin said, “Well I suppose you can ask for a continuance,…
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