Trey Gowdy appears on Fox to discuss the anticipated points and counterpoints, accusations and defenses, and strategy within the upcoming impeachment trial.
Today it was also announced that President Trump’s defense team added Ken Starr, Alan Dershowitz, Robert Ray, Pam Bondi and Jane Raskin. Those five will join Pat Cipollone and Jay Sekulow who are the primary defense lawyers.
Adopted today by unanimous consent:
Senators will not be allowed to bring their cell phones or any electronic device into the Senate chamber while the trial is underway.
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In advance of the Senate beginning the impeachment trial of President Trump, the upper chamber ratified the USMCA trade agreement with an 89-10 vote. The agreement now moves to the White House where President Trump will sign it.
The final ratification is the result of two-years worth of renegotiated trade reform, and the outcome gained bipartisan support in both the House and Senate. The only republican senator who voted against the deal was Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania who is concerned the USMCA will weaken the position of Wall Street multinationals.
Nine democrat senators did not support the agreement because there wasn’t enough verbiage to support their climate change priorities, and the USMCA does not align with the Paris Climate Accord. [Vote Tally Here]
USMCA gives American producers better access to Canadian dairy markets, and creates a cornerstone for a revitalized U.S. manufacturing base. The deal has much more strict rules of origination for the auto-sector with 75% of parts and materials must be made in north America. Combined with the requirement that 40% of those industrial parts must come from plants where workers make a minimum of $16/hr, the U.S. auto-industry will gain significant benefits.
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Today begins the official Senate trial of President Donald John Trump. Chief Justice John Roberts will be swearing-in all senators to begin the impeachment trial at 2:00pm ET.
First there will be a call of the roll to ensure all senators present; then the arrival of Chief Justice Roberts; then the oath of duty administered by Senator Grassley to the ¹Chief Justice of the United States, John Roberts; then Justice Roberts will swear-in all standing Senators to their oath of duty for trial.
Following the affirmation of oath, all senators will affix their signature or mark to the Senate “oath book” documenting their declaration and affirmation. Video Added:
Sickening. Earlier today Speaker Nancy Pelosi held a media event signing ceremony complete with commemorative pens for dozens of her Democrat colleagues, and initiated the parade ceremony for the march across the Capitol with the articles. Upon arrival at the upper chamber of congress, Senate Leader Mitch McConnell accepted delivery and began the process of organizing the procedure through a series of rules by unanimous consent.
[McConnell] “A few minutes ago, the Senate was notified the House of Representatives is finally ready to proceed with their articles of impeachment. So, by unanimous consent, we’ve just laid some of the groundwork that will structure the next several days.”
- We have officially invited the House managers to come to the Senate tomorrow at noon to exhibit their articles of impeachment.
- Then, later tomorrow afternoon at 2:00pm, the Chief Justice of the United States will arrive here in the Senate. He will be sworn in by the President Pro Tem, Senator Grassley.
- Then the Chief Justice will swear in all of us senators. We will pledge to rise above petty factionalism and do justice for our institutions, for our states, and for the nation.
- And then we will formally notify the White House of our pending trial and summon the President to answer the articles and send his counsel.
‘So the trial will commence in earnest on Tuesday.
As the House debated the fiasco of their vote to submit two articles of impeachment to the Senate chamber, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy rises in opposition:
Today Nancy Pelosi announced seven House “impeachment managers” who will transmit the two articles of impeachment from the House to the Senate.
Speaker Pelosi selected: Adam Schiff (HPSCI Chairman – lead), Jerry Nadler (HJC Chairman), Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Rep. Val Demings (D-FL), Rep. Jason Crow (D-CO), Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-TX).
It does not seem accidental that Pelosi’s team of Lawfare advisors selected Adam Schiff and Zoe Lofgren who are two of the key people who helped construct the fraudulent whistle-blower complaint; and both of whom would be fact witnesses if the ‘whistle-blower’ is called into question. By announcing them as prosecutors for the House Pelosi is attempting to isolate them from testimony.
As we predicted in early 2019, the democrats will use great fanfare to create a spectacle of delivering the physical impeachment articles to the Senate. Remember Pelosi with the parade and big gavel in 2010 on the day they passed the partisan Obamacare bill?
Today’s grand optical parade will be promoted for the same intents and purposes.
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There was a major discrepancy in the Inspector General report on FISA abuse, that appears to have been overlooked and casts a considerable cloud upon the DOJ Office of Inspector General and Michael Horowitz.
In chapter ten of the report, on page #312 you will find the following information. The claim is that no-one in the FBI initiated any use of “Confidential Human Sources” into the campaign prior to opening the Crossfire Hurricane investigation. Read Carefully:
“In our review, we did not find any evidence that the FBI used CHSs or UCEs to interact with members of the Trump campaign prior to the opening of the Crossfire Hurricane investigation.”…
However, in the very next chapter (#11, page #400), in the original IG report as released on December 9th, 2019, you will find the following statement:
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U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin appears on FOX Business to discuss the U.S-China ‘phase-one’ trade agreement, the benefits, enforcement mechanisms and retention of tariffs and particular sanctions until compliance can be reviewed.
Phase-1 establishes the baselines; resets the ability of U.S. companies to enter China; establishes rules for market entry; and sets the parameters for enforcement. Any future phase is contingent upon evaluation of phase-one enforcement mechanisms.
Yesterday’s ridiculous, albeit proactive, New York Times narrative about Russians hacking Burisma now makes sense. Today the Lawfare team (Mary McCord et al) within Adam Schiff’s impeachment crew send additional files of evidence (pdf below) to be included in the impeachment articles constructed by HJC Chairman Jerry Nadler.
It is all coordinated. The “new evidence” relates to information turned over by Lev Parnas, an SDNY indicted former associate of Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani. The Lawfare purpose is to bolster their premise that President Trump was trying to force Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Joe Biden’s corrupt activity around the Ukrainian company Burisma.
The Lawfare crew behind Schiff waited until the last minute to push the new “evidence” because they didn’t want republicans to deconstruct it during the impeachment evidence gathering phase. Aditionally, the Lawfare crew anticipate a Trump impeachment defense surrounding actual evidence of the Biden corruption, which makes the Trump request to Zelensky valid.
So the proactive democrat strategy was/is to use the New York Times presentation of Russia hacking Burisma to negate the provenance of the evidence against the Bidens. In essence, to cast doubt upon any documents that would show Joe and Hunter Biden participating in an actual influence and money-laundering scheme.
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