The bottom-of-the-barrel lawyers representing malignant narcissist, demagogue and would-be dictator Donald "Mango Mussolini" Trump offered up attacks, diversions and more attacks in their two and a half hour defense of their despicable client's behavior before, during and after the assault on the Capitol. Especially vile was the "defense" put up by personal injury attorney / "ambulance chaser" Michael van der Veen, whose website advertises settlements he's won for injured bicyclists and for not guilty verdicts in drug and DUI cases. Perhaps his biggest howler yesterday was this:
"No thinking person could seriously believe that the president's January 6 speech on the ellipse was in any way an incitement to violence or insurrection. This suggestion is patently absurd on its face."
That risible statement may have set off a light breeze from eye rolling and muffled laughter in the Senate chamber. There have been numerous fact checks of Trump's lawyers' lies and evasions in their brief presentation, including ones here and here.
Observing yesterday's charade, conservative attorney and unfortunate spouse of Trump dead-ender Kellyanne, George Conway writes in today's Washington Post:
"It wasn’t a defense. Not in any serious factual, legal, or logical sense.
What former president Donald Trump’s lawyers offered on the floor of the U.S. Senate on Friday was an attack — a misleading, distortive, gaslighting, repetitive, irrelevant and, at times, absurd although mercifully brief — attack. It was an attack on the House impeachment managers, on Democrats, on the impeachment process. It was an attack on everything but the evidence against Trump.
It was a disgrace, like the man it failed to defend."
In the same paper, the editorial board dismantles the numerous dishonest arguments made by Trump's defense team:
"The former president’s defense team attempted to gaslight the Senate by insisting that Mr. Trump is a longtime peacemaker. They accused Democrats of having wanted to impeach Mr. Trump for years, which says nothing about whether he deserves it in this circumstance. They showed endless videos of Democrats talking about “fighting” for political causes, making it seem as though they were as guilty as Mr. Trump of encouraging and condoning extremism. They played tape of Democrats praising Black Lives Matter protesters and making it seem as though they were praising rioters. [snip]
Mr. Trump’s lawyers had no explanation and no defense, because there is none. Nor could they explain or defend how Mr. Trump watched and even egged on the mob as it ransacked the Capitol and threatened the vice president and members of Congress. Republican senators hoping for even a fig leaf to cover the cowardice of a vote to acquit had to have been disappointed. They were given no plausible excuse for failing to hold a dangerous man to account."
Read that last sentence and consider the post below regarding the heated conversation between Trump and blow-dried hack Rep. Kevin McCarthy on the day of the insurrection. It provides damning evidence that Trump knew the dangerous riot was threatening lives and did nothing. Given that and everything else, we still anticipate the Senate Republicans will come up with multiple excuses for acquitting Mango Mussolini.
BONUS:
Trump’s lawyer really giving personal injury lawyers a bad name.
— Daniel Goldman (@danielsgoldman) February 13, 2021
(photo: Trump's legal team of Argew Lyon & Phibb. AP)
