Trump's lawyer reverses administration's longstanding position of keeping White House-Congress disputes out of courts
Jay Sekulow apparently missed a few memos from the Trump administration.
Sekulow, who is serving as President Trump's outside lawyer in the Senate's impeachment trial, argued Tuesday that disputes between the White House and Congress are "why we have courts." But as the Department of Justice has repeatedly argued, including as recently as last month, that's not what this administration believes.
Arguments began Tuesday in the impeachment trial of Trump, during which House impeachment managers and Trump's defense team debated Republican-back rules for the trial. That's when Sekulow took shots at House Democrats who brought the charges against Trump, saying they should've let the courts rule on their subpoenas for documents and testimony from Trump administration officials before moving forward with impeachment. If they took issue with Trump claiming executive privilege to block those subpoenas, well, "it is why we have courts," Sekulow said.
Yet in December court filing regarding a House lawsuit against former White House Counsel Don McGahn, the Trump administration argued the opposite is true. Asking the court to "weigh in" on the subpoena "when political tensions are at their highest levels" reveals "why this sort of interbranch dispute is not one that has 'traditionally thought to be capable of resolution through the judicial process,'" the DOJ wrote.
Sekulow also alleged the Mueller report cleared Trump of collusion, which isn't a crime and not something former Special Counsel Robert Mueller even investigated. And as for Sekulow's claim that House Republicans weren't allowed into closed-door impeachment hearings, well, 48 of them were.
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