What happened Saturday? Trump’s legal team began their opening arguments by seeking to cast doubt on Democrats’ case that Trump tried to pressure Ukraine into investigating Joe Biden. Over the course of a two-hour session, Trump’s lawyer Pat Cipollone and his deputy Michael Purpura argued that Trump had valid reasons for withholding military aid from Ukraine and that House prosecutors overlooked facts, noting that witnesses in the House’s impeachment hearings based their assessments on “presumptions” and “guesswork” rather than knowledge of Trump’s intentions. “We don’t believe that they have come anywhere close to meeting their burden for what they’re asking you to do,” Cipollone said. They also argued that the words Trump spoke on his July 25 call to Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, conveyed no pressure — and that Ukrainians never publicly expressed any. Cipollone added that Democrats are “asking you to tear up all of the ballots all across the country” and “perpetrate the most massive interference in an election in American history.”
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://whatthefuckjusthappenedtoday.com/2020/01/27/day-1103/
