WASHINGTON _ President Donald Trump will offer his first formal impeachment response Saturday, on the same day that House Democrats reveal their legal strategy to argue that he should be removed from office.
The case that House prosecutors send to the Senate will reference new evidence that wasn't part of the impeachment inquiry, including new material from Lev Parnas, an associate of Trump's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, according to Democratic officials familiar with the argument.
Parnas, who was arrested in October and indicted on campaign finance violations, this month provided House committees with documents to reinforce accusations that the president was personally involved in efforts to pressure Ukraine to conduct investigations that would benefit him politically
While the Republican-led Senate is extremely unlikely to convict Trump on the House's two charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress, his defense lawyers and the House prosecutors have another important audience: the American people weighing Trump's re-election this year.
The White House declined to participate in the House's investigation, so this will be the first time that Trump's counsel addresses the merits of the case against him, rather than simply criticizing the process.
The president's legal team, including Ken Starr, who served as independent counsel for the impeachment of President Bill Clinton, has until 6 p.m. EST on Saturday to respond to the Senate's summons and must file its trial brief by noon on Monday.
"President Trump has done nothing wrong and is confident that this team will defend him, the voters, and our democracy from this baseless, illegitimate impeachment," White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham said in a statement on Friday night.
The House's prosecution team _ seven impeachment managers led by Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff _ must file its first trial brief by 5 p.m. EST Saturday. The managers will also have the option to respond to Trump's initial legal arguments before the Senate reconvenes on Tuesday for the trial.
At least four of the impeachment managers, including Schiff, are scheduled to appear Sunday on political talk shows. All of them will be back in Washington on Sunday, and they'll do a walk-through of the Senate chamber Monday on the eve of the trial, the officials said.
The House prosecutors will argue that the trial should include additional witnesses and evidence, which is also a central demand from Senate Democrats. Trump blocked key administration officials from participating in the House investigation and refused to comply with document requests.
The officials familiar with the prosecution said the managers will argue that blocking witnesses goes against the history of impeachment trials, pointing out that Mitch McConnell in 1999 argued in favor of a request for three witnesses during Clinton's impeachment.
McConnell, now the Senate majority leader, has said that Trump's trial will follow the Clinton precedent and consider the question of witnesses after the opening arguments and senator questions.
The impeachment managers will also defend the admissibility of new evidence not presented during the House investigation _ such as the material from Parnas _ the officials said, adding that this wasn't an issue in the 1999 trial since the Clinton administration provided some 90,000 documents to investigators.
