Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Ted Cruz (R-TX), and Mike Lee (R-UT) met on Thursday with former President Donald Trump’s lawyers ahead of the team’s defense argument on the Senate floor Friday.
All three senators are lawyers and no doubt offered advice or even admonitions after the lackluster presentation on the first day of the impeachment trial for what House Democrats claim was Trump’s incitement of the violent siege of the U.S. Capitol on January 6:
The Boston Globe reported on the meetup:
After the meeting, Trump lawyer David Schoen told reporters they were “just talking about procedure,” calling them “friendly guys.”
Senator Cruz later said that he was the one who suggested the meeting, which lasted about an hour. “I just wanted to sit down and say, OK, what are you looking to put forward and to share our thoughts in terms of where things are,” Cruz told Fox News Thursday night. He said he urged the defense team to focus on “legal standard.” While Democrats made their most graphic case to the American public, Trump’s lawyers and Republicans are focusing on legal rather than emotional or historic questions.
Schoen said the Senators did not tip him off to the questions they would be asking during Friday’s trial. They discussed “just how this format goes, you know, the question-and-answer period, all that,” Schoen said. “And then just talking about where they’re from and all that, but it’s just very nice. I said to them it was a great honor to have the opportunity to talk to them.”
Schoen told Fox News Thursday the former president is “very upbeat” despite being impeached by Democrats in the House for a second time but that Trump also resents claims he is responsible for criminal behavior.
“He’s quite offended at trying to be tied to it,” Schoen said.
Schoen said he is confident of the defense case.
“I think you will be moved by what you see,” Schoen said.
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