Witnesses at the Impeachment Trial

Provided that the Democrats don’t simply cut their losses and pull the plug on this impeachment clown show, it’s likely they’ll continue their demands for “new” witnesses. They’re touting polls that supposedly show majority support among the public for witnesses, although the polls don’t indicate whose witnesses–the President’s or Democrat House Managers’ witnesses. Are we talking Hunter Biden and the so-called sham whistleblower? We’d all like to hear from them.

However this issue plays out (if there are at least four mendacious so-called Republicans who vote with the lock-step, weaselly Democrats), then I would hope that all Senators would honor the Constitution and the foundations of our system of justice. In other words, ensure due process for the President, something he hasn’t received to date.

Due process would mean, at the very least, that President Trump should be allowed to confront and cross-examine every, and I mean every, witness against him.

That would require recalling to the stand, under oath, every person from whom the Democrats gathered testimony or evidence, whether documentary or in person, and allowing a public and thorough cross-examination and testing of their credibility. 

Due process would also require that all previous testimonies (transcripts) and depositions be provided to the President’s lawyers so that these witnesses, like all witnesses in civil and criminal trials, would be subject to impeachment for any false or prior inconsistent statements. And then the President should be able to call any and every witness he wants to refute their testimony and give context.

Most certainly, due process would include the testimony of the inspector general of the intelligence community, Michael Atkinson, who was involved in the initiation of this entire sham persecution of the President, and whose deposition remains unavailable to both the public and the President and his lawyers.

The President’s lawyers have not yet been able to confront any of the witnesses, much less cross-examine them.

The President has not even been given the name of the person who initiated this action against him. That’s hardly giving him the right to confront witnesses against him.

Note that the Democrats and the media insist on the necessity of “new“ witnesses, signaling that they have no intention of allowing the President’s lawyers to recall or cross-examine or impeach their hand-picked previous witnesses, most of whom gave only unchallenged hearsay “evidence.”

This scheme in no way meets the requirements of the Bill of Rights, the Constitution, or our system of government from its inception. Indeed, the right to confront witnesses goes all the way back to Roman law.

Oh, yes. We know. The Sixth Amendment concerns criminal trials, but who among us dare argue that the President of the United States does not have the same rights as an accused criminal or that Congress should be constitutionally able to overturn the will of We the People and throw out 63,000,000+ votes on a political whim, all to interfere in our right to vote next November for the person We the People want as president, after stomping on the due process and constitutional rights of the man We the People already elected to the presidency?

Any member of Congress who makes such an argument should be tossed from office for not living up to his or her own oath of office and for spitting on our Constitution.

The idea of a public trial is to ensure that government prosecutorial actions are exposed to public view, so as to discourage abuses of prosecutorial power. The old English Star Chamber, whose proceedings were held in secret and which was a model for prosecutorial abuse, comes to mind. So does Germany’s People’s Court under the Hitler regime.

The President deserves due process and the ability to confront all witnesses against him, to cross-examine and impeach their credibility.

This long-overdue confrontation must be done publicly, not in secret as we saw happen during the Adam Schiff Star Chamber in the House.

We the People deserve answers. Now.

Release all the transcripts.

Give the President’s lawyers the right to cross-examine the old witnesses, before even considering calling new witnesses.

If the Senate actually believes that they should overturn our votes and spit in our faces by impeaching our President using a completely and transparently unfair and unconstitutional process, then they do so at their own peril, because Trump supporters will abandon the Republican Party (and in some cases the Democrat Party) if they railroad our President out of office.

One would hope that even people who don’t support the President would be equally outraged over this travesty of so-called justice.

Some time this coming week the Senate will decide whether to allow witnesses.

They had better choose fairness, justice, due process, the Constitution, and the American Way.

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