Bill Clark/AP

Three hours before the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump was set to begin in the Senate, the House impeachment managers sent a letter to Trump’s lawyer, Pat Cipollone, accusing him of being a “material witness” in the case and demanding that he disclose any first-hand knowledge of evidence that he will present in the impeachment trial.

According to the letter, which was delivered to the White House Tuesday morning, Cipollone was deeply involved in the Ukraine scandal at the center of the president’s impeachment from the beginning. The Democratic House managers argue that in his role as White House counsel, Cipollone knew about the concerns raised by all the key players who testified about the president’s phone call with the president of Ukraine. These include Fiona Hill, the former top White House adviser on Russia; Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the Ukraine expert on the National Security Council; and Timothy Morrison, a former NSC aide to John Eisenberg, the top NSC lawyer. In his NSC role, Eisenberg directly reports to Cipollone. 

“You must disclose all facts and information as to which you have first-hand knowledge that will be at issue in connection with evidence you present or arguments you make in your role as the President’s legal advocate so that the Senate and Chief Justice can be apprised of any potential ethical issues, conflicts, or biases,” the House managers wrote in the letter. The managers also accuse Cipollone of being involved in the president’s briefing on the whistleblower complaint that sparked impeachment “and in the decision to withhold that complaint from Congress in violation of the law.”

The letter notes that “ethical rules generally preclude a lawyer from acting as an advocate at a trial in which he is likely also a necessary witness.” Though the House managers do not ask Cipollone to recuse himself from the trial, they do ask him to “disclose all facts and information as to which you have first-hand knowledge that will be at issue in connection with evidence you present or arguments you make in your role as the President’s legal advocate.” 

Read the letter below or by clicking here.

House Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving, center, leads the way through the rotunda on his way to the Senate to exhibit the articles of Impeachment against President Donald Trump on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, Jan. 16, 2020, followed by impeachment managers.Julio Cortez/AP Photo

On Saturday, House Democrats made their formal case to the Senate that President Donald Trump should be removed from office for withholding military aid as a ploy to pressure Ukrainian officials to investigate his political opponent.

In the 111-page brief, impeachment managers argued that their evidence showed Trump was guilty of both abuse of power and obstruction of justice and that the Senate should remove Trump to safeguard the 2020 election and “eliminate the threat that the President poses to America’s national security.” 

Here’s how House Democrats summed up their case, which echoes the findings from House Judiciary and Intelligence committees: 

President Trump abused the powers of his office to invite foreign interference in an election for his own personal political gain and to the detriment of American national security interests. He abandoned his oath to faithfully execute the laws and betrayed his public trust. President Trump’s misconduct presents a danger to our democratic processes, our national security, and our commitment to the rule of law. He must be removed from office.

You can read the full document here.

In an initial response, Trump’s legal team argued in a six-page brief that the Democrats’ impeachment was “constitutionally invalid,” adding that the articles themselves were an “affront to the Constitution.” They added that the impeachment investigation was part of a “brazen and unlawful attempt to overturn the results of the 2016 election and interfere with the 2020 election.” Opening arguments for the impeachment trial will begin in earnest on January 21. 

Former Baylor President Ken Starr waits to run onto the field before an NCAA college football game 2015. LM Otero/AP

Ahead of the Senate impeachment trial that will move forward on January 21, President Donald Trump on Friday hired two new additions to his legal team: former Harvard University law professor Alan Dershowitz and Bill Clinton impeachment prosecutor Kenneth Starr. This duo will be busy assisting Trump as he tries to fend off charges that he abused presidential power by withholding military aid to Ukraine.

But Dershowitz and Starr may also have to fend off scrutiny of their own baggage. Before they joined Trump’s legal team and served as talking heads on Fox News, Dershowitz, who will reportedly make the oral arguments during the impeachment proceedings, and Starr played roles in helping wealthy financier Jeffery Epstein escape with a lenient plea deal in 2008.

Epstein faced multiple counts of soliciting and trafficking underage girls. Dershowitz helped discredit some of Epstein’s accusers and helped negotiate a “non-prosecution agreement” between Epstein and federal prosecutors in Florida under the helm of then-US attorney Alexander Acosta. Starr also served on Epstein’s legal team. The deal allowed Epstein to plead guilty to two state charges of prostitution, one involving a minor, and avoid federal charges, even though Epstein reportedly continued to abuse girls. The legal team made the deal without informing Epstein’s accusers and the deal itself granted immunity for “potential co-conspirators.”

Acosta later reportedly said he felt immense pressure from Epstein’s lawyers, including Starr and Dershowitz, during the deal. Acosta would eventually become Trump’s labor secretary and would later resign in the wake of criticism over his role in the Epstein case. In 2019, Epstein, who faced trafficking charges in New York, died by suicide in a Manhattan facility. 

Ken Starr became a household name during former President Bill Clinton’s impeachment proceedings. But fewer people followed Starr’s career moves after the Clinton presidency. In 2010, Starr became president of Baylor University. Arguably the most striking part of his tenure came toward the end: In 2016, Baylor split ties with Starr after an external review found that university officials failed to implement Title IX as it mishandled sexual assault cases involving several football players at the university going back to 2009.

During Starr’s tenure, Baylor’s football program, led by Art Briles, won two Big 12 championship titles. While the team’s performance seemed on the surface like a major success story, it was later revealed that Baylor’s athletics department and its football program had been botching its own inquiries into allegations of sexual assault against players. Baylor ultimately ousted Briles in May 2016. 

As my colleague Madison Pauly and I detailed in 2016, investigators for Pepper Hamilton, the law firm hired to conduct the Baylor investigation, found “institutional failures” at “every level.” 

Specifically: 

The choices made by football staff and athletics leadership, in some instances, posed a risk to campus safety and the integrity of the University. In certain instances, including reports of a sexual assault by multiple football players, athletics and football personnel affirmatively chose not to report sexual violence.

Starr stayed mostly quiet when allegations of sexual violence surfaced on campus. After he announced he would step down as chancellor in June 2016, Starr told ESPN that he “didn’t know what was happening” regarding the university’s handling of sexual assault allegations but accepted responsibility “as a matter of conscience.” “The captain goes down with the ship,” Starr said.

Since then, Starr has been a constant presence on Fox News. It’ll be worth watching what role he’ll will play in defending Trump, who once called the former Clinton prosecutor a “lunatic” and “off his rocker.” 

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi with Reps. Sylvia Garcia and Jerrold NadlerMatt Rourke/AP

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday announced the seven members of Congress who will serve as managers in Donald Trump’s impeachment trial: Reps. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.), Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), Jason Crow (D-Colo.), Val Demmings (D-Fla.), Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), and Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas). 

“The emphasis is on litigators,” Pelosi said of the seven Democrats selected as impeachment managers. “The emphasis is on comfort level in the courtroom. The emphasis is making the strongest possible case to protect and defend our Constitution.”

As impeachment managers, these Democrats will act as prosecutors, arguing in front of the Senate that the president should be removed from office for abusing his powers and obstructing Congress. 

Pelosi is expected to sign the articles of impeachment in an engrossment ceremony Wednesday at 5 pm. Afterward, the impeachment managers will deliver the two articles of impeachment to the Senate, where a trial is expected to begin on Tuesday, according to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. The Senate requires a two-thirds vote in order for Trump to be removed from office.

Yuri Oreshkin/Zuma

After months of reticence, former national security adviser John Bolton announced Monday on his PAC website that should the Senate subpoena him, he would be willing to testify in President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial.

In November, Bolton conditioned his participation in House impeachment proceedings on the outcome of a lawsuit filed by his former deputy, Charles Kupperman, about whether presidential advisers are immune from congressional subpoena. The House Intelligence Committee did not subpoena Bolton, saying that it would rather forgo Bolton’s testimony than allow “the Administration to play rope-a-dope with us in the courts for months.” Now, Bolton has affirmed that he would comply with a subpoena from the Senate—although it’s unclear whether the Senate will subpoena any witnesses at all.

Bolton’s behavior has left a lot of room for speculation about how strongly—if at all—he would defend the president regarding the Ukraine scandal. Bolton reportedly referred to the doings of Ambassador Gordon Sondland and acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney as a “drug deal” and expressed alarm at Trump’s attempts to get the president of Ukraine to investigate Burisma, the natural gas company on whose board former Vice President Joe Biden’s son once sat. Still, Bolton’s enthusiasm for Trump’s killing of Iranian military leader Qassem Soleimani suggests he may have a new motivation to defend the president.

President Donald Trump speaks as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky looks on during a meeting in New York on September 25, 2019.Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images

Newly revealed communications between White House staffers and officials at the Pentagon are shedding additional light on the Ukraine scandal—even as the Senate prepares for President Donald Trump’s trial following his impeachment by the House of Representatives last month. Just Security reported Thursday that Michael Duffey, a political appointee who oversees defense spending at the White House Office of Management and Budget, told Pentagon Comptroller Elaine McCusker in an August 30 email that he had “clear direction from POTUS to continue to hold” vital military aid that was supposed to be sent to Ukraine. That statement was one of a number of redacted lines in 300 pages of emails the administration released last month to the Center for Public Integrity after a court order in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit. Just Security says it reviewed unredacted copies of the emails.

The emails obtained by Just Security also raise questions about Vice President Mike Pence’s role in Trump’s efforts to pressure Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky to announce investigations of Trump’s political enemies. Pence met with Zelensky on September 1. Prior to this meeting, Eric Chewning, chief of staff to acting Defense Secretary Mike Esper, told McCusker, in reference to the hold on Ukrainian aide: “The Ukrainian PM speaks with VPOTUS on Tuesday. We expect the issue to get resolved then.” (The email appears to misstate Zelensky’s job; he is Ukraine’s president, not its prime minister.)

The emails don’t say why officials thought Pence could resolve the matter. But Trump reportedly pushed Pence to urge Zelensky to take more aggressive action on corruption. It has since become clear that Trump’s references to corruption in Ukraine were actually calls for investigations into Joe Biden and bogus allegations about Ukrainians interfering in the 2016 election to help Hillary Clinton. And Gordon Sondland, Trump’s ambassador to the European Union, testified in November that he told Pence just before the vice president’s meeting with Zelensky that Ukraine would receive its stalled aid money only if it announced the investigations Trump sought. Pence, through an aide, has denied Sondland’s account and has asserted he did not know that Trump’s references to corruption related to Biden and the 2016 election. But the same day that Pence met with Zelensky, Sondland told a Zelensky aide, Andriy Yermak, that security assistance money would not be released until Zelensky agreed to announce an investigation related to Biden, according to Sondland and former White House national security official Tim Morrison. Pence’s office is resisting congressional calls for more information on the VP’s role in Ukraine, refusing to declassify details of a September 18 call he had with Zelensky.

The Just Security account describes repeated emails from McCusker to Duffey and others warning that the ongoing hold might be  illegal—a potential violation of a law requiring the executive branch to spend money as appropriated by Congress or to tell lawmakers why it refused to do so, which the administration did not do. Duffey enforced the hold by inserting a footnote in budget documents. It said in part that the “pause in obligations will not preclude DOD’s timely execution of the final policy direction.” By August 9, though, McCusker warned him in an email that the hold could prevent the Pentagon from transmitting the money before the end of the fiscal year on September 30 and pushed for changing the footnote to reflect that reality. 

Yet in a December 11 letter to the Government Accountability Office, OMB General Counsel Mark Paoletta claimed that “at no point during the pause in obligations did DOD [Office of General Counsel] indicate to OMB that, as a matter of law, the apportionments would prevent DOD from being able to obligate the funds before the end of the fiscal year.” This seems misleading. McCusker, while not in DOD’s Office of General Counsel, had asked Duffey if OMB had cleared its actions with that office and had repeatedly raised concerns about the department’s ability to pay out the funds. The Trump administration released the aid to Ukraine after a whistleblower exposed the the matter, though some of funds remain unpaid.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said in a statement Thursday that the newly revealed emails undermine efforts by the Senate’s Republican leadership to hold a trial for Trump without key documents or testimony from witnesses, including Duffey, White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, former national security adviser John Bolton, and Robert Blair, another top OMB official. “Importantly, that Mr. Duffey said there was ‘clear direction from POTUS to continue to hold’ only further implicates President Trump and underscores the need for the Senate to subpoena the witnesses and documents we’ve requested at the onset of a trial,” Schumer said. “The American people deserve a fair trial that gets to the truth, not a rigged process that enables a cover-up.”

Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) are sparring with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who has said hopes to acquit Trump after a brief, limited Senate trial. McConnell said he plans to work closely with the White House during the process and stated last month that he is “not an impartial juror.” Senate rules require members  to pledge “to do impartial justice” at the outset of an impeachment trial.

Thursday’s report is part of a stream of revelations that makes it clear the Trump administration is still sitting on a substantial amount of relevant information that has not been made available to Congress or the public. Trump and his backers say he did nothing wrong. So what are they hiding?

Richard Graulich/Palm Beach Post via ZUMA Wire

Happy New Year! I hope you had a fun and safe holiday! I spent most of the last few weeks offline—driving, and running, and reading (let me be the last person to recommend Furious Hours), and just generally trying to forget how absolutely insane it is that this is how the president of the United States communicates with the world on a daily basis:

….had happened to a Presidential candidate, or President, who was a Democrat, everybody involved would long ago be in jail for treason (and more), and it would be considered the CRIME OF THE CENTURY, far bigger and more sinister than Watergate!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 2, 2020

Those are from this morning. The “Witch Hunt” is the impeachment push and the Russia and Ukraine scandals. The “Dirty (Filthy) Cops” are, presumably, the FBI agents who investigated a not insignificant number of Trump associates. A recent DOJ inspector general report faulted the FBI’s handling of a warrant to surveil one former Trump aide, but six other former Trump aides were convicted or pleaded guilty as part of the Russia probe. It’s tempting to try to unpack this further—actually, 9/11 was the crime of the century, Mr. President—and to explain why it’s bad and weird for the president to say that people in his government should be jailed for treason “(and more),” but I still have holiday brain, and if you’re reading this post, you probably don’t need to be told all of that.

Still, every once in a while the social media algorithms take a break from their frustrating idiosyncrasies and offer true revelation. And this, from my colleague Ben Dreyfuss, is one of those moments:

Evan Vucci/AP

In the months since a whistleblower in the US intelligence community sounded the alarm about the Ukraine scandal, the president has taken every opportunity to attack the anonymous individual. Trump has said the whistleblower should be investigated “for fraud” and has called on media outlets to expose the whistleblower’s identity. Perhaps not surprisingly, that rhetoric seems to be having a chilling effect on other federal workers’ willingness to report corruption within the federal government.

According to a new poll conducted by the Government Business Council, the research arm of Government Executive, one-in-three federal workers say they are now less likely to “report an act of perceived wrongdoing to the appropriate authorities” because of the attacks on the whistleblower by Trump and his allies. Specifically, 19 percent said they are now “much less” likely to report wrongdoing, and 15 percent responded that are “somewhat less” likely to do so. The good news is that half of respondents said that Trump’s attacks would have no impact are their willingness to expose malfeasance, and 16 percent said they were now more likely to blow the whistle.

According to Government Executive, the poll, which has a margin of error of plus-or-minus 4 percent, was sent to a random sample of its subscribers. That may not precisely represent all federal employees, but it’s still a pretty big deal that more than a third of respondents said the president’s intimidation tactics would make them less likely to report corruption.

Those results are understandable considering what the Ukraine whistleblower has gone through since coming forward. During the House’s impeachment inquiry, Trump ramped up the personal attacks, tweeting about that person more than 100 times. That helped lead to a bevy of threats aimed at the whistleblower and their attorneys, according to a source close to the legal team. As David Corn explains:

In remarks made at the US mission to the United Nations on September 27, Trump compared the whistleblower to a “spy,” and added, “You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart? Right? With spies and treason, right?” This was a clear reference to execution: This guy deserves to die. In recent tweets, Trump has approvingly quoted his defenders, who have accused the whistleblower of being corrupt and conspiring with Democrats to topple Trump, and Trump has blasted the whistleblower’s attorneys as “fake.” On Monday, Trump tweeted: “the Whistleblower, his lawyer and Corrupt politician Schiff should be investigated for fraud!” 

That rhetoric hasn’t just made federal workers less likely to report corruption. The survey found that 50 percent of respondents said that Trump’s and the GOP’s rhetoric around the whistleblower has had a negative impact on their perception of their own safety. And 64 percent said that rhetoric has eroded the public’s perception of their jobs. 

Mother Jones illustration; Getty

For the third time in United States history, the House of Representatives has voted to impeach the president.

In a vote that fell largely along party lines, 229 Democrats and one independent voted to impeach President Donald Trump for abuse of power, while 195 House Republicans and two Democrats voted against impeachment, for a total vote count of 230–197. On obstruction of Congress, 228 Democrats and one Independent voted yea, while 195 Republicans and three Democrats voted nay, for a total of 229–198.

An investigation that started with an anonymous whistleblower’s complaint has compelled Congress to take the most serious step outlined in the Constitution and attempt to remove Trump from office. Before Trump, only two presidents—Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton—had been impeached. Neither was convicted in the Senate. The House began impeachment investigations into Richard Nixon in 1973, but he resigned in 1974 before the House could vote him out of office.

Listen to Washington DC bureau chief David Corn break down the political prospects for President Donald Trump as the Republican-controlled Senate prepares for its impeachment trial, on this special edition of the Mother Jones Podcast:

In September, a whistleblower alleged that, during a July 25 phone call with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, Trump had demanded that Zelensky investigate the family of former Vice President Joe Biden in exchange for nearly $400 million in military aid. In response, the White House released a memo on Trump’s call with Zelensky in which Trump is quoted as saying, “I want you to do us a favor, though,” before requesting that Zelensky investigate Biden’s son, Hunter, as well as a debunked conspiracy theory about the 2016 election.

The following three months of impeachment investigations in the House Intelligence Committee garnered damning testimony from foreign ambassadors and high-ranking government officials who confirmed the whistleblower’s sequencing of events. After holding a brief set of hearings, the House Judiciary Committee drew up articles of impeachment based on Trump’s dealings with Ukraine.

The Republican-controlled Senate will now hear the impeachment case and vote on whether to convict Trump of the high crimes and misdemeanors laid out in the article of impeachment. The Senate trial is expected to begin in January. On Tuesday, Trump sent Pelosi a desperate letter requesting that she drop the impeachment vote. Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell refused to allow Democrats to subpoena John Bolton and Mick Mulvaney ahead of a potential Senate trial.

Dennis Van Tine/ZUMA

This vintage clip of Donald Trump in an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer is a doozy: In it, Trump calls Nancy Pelosi “impressive,” defends former President Bill Clinton, and says the impeachment of former President George W. Bush “would have been a wonderful thing.”

Blitzer resurfaced the clip on his Twitter account today while the House was busy clearing the way for now-President Trump’s impeachment. In the interview, shot in October 2008, Trump wastes no time in praising House Speaker Pelosi, calling her “a very impressive person” and telling Blitzer that he “like[s] her a lot.” He said he was surprised that she didn’t pursue the impeachment of Bush after he misled Americans about Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction. He then goes on to defend Clinton, saying that Republicans had impeached him for something “totally unimportant.”

Try to resist the urge to roll your eyes as you watch the video below.

This 2008 clip from .@WolfBlitzer has EVERYTHING. Trump praising Pelosi, calling for Bush's impeachment, and defending Bill Clinton. Here's a treat for you while we all wait for the final vote. pic.twitter.com/dsCoWMr1iR

— Mother Jones (@MotherJones) December 18, 2019