Partisan battle or quick jury trial? Cruz and Cornyn part ways on impeachment process
As the historic Senate impeachment trial of President Donald Trump started Thursday, Texas’ U.S. senators had different views on how they hope it will unfold: While Sen. John Cornyn wants senators to be like criminal jurors, Sen. Ted Cruz is eager for a more partisan showdown.
The basic structure of the trial will feature seven “impeachment managers” who were chosen by the House Democratic leadership. They will present the case against the president, condensed from investigations conducted by six House committees.
The president will then be able to offer a defense. Senators will ultimately take a final vote, and 67 votes will be required to remove the president from office. Republicans control 53 of the 100 Senate seats.
Cornyn, a Republican and former Texas Supreme Court associate justice, said the Senate’s job in the impeachment trial is like that of a criminal jury in a criminal trial.
“In no courtroom in America does the jury decide which witnesses it calls,” Cornyn told the Star-Telegram this week. “The jury is supposed to sit there and listen and then render a verdict, not run the trial.”
He didn’t rule out additional witnesses completely, saying the Senate will defer the decision on whether to call witnesses until after both sides present their case. It would take 51 senators to approve calling a witness.
“I hope it’s expeditious,” Cornyn said. “Because we’re all going to be there — we’re going to be sitting there six days a week and can’t do anything else. I don’t think there’s any need to string this out.”
Cruz, a Republican, has been trumpeting the possibility of witnesses being called, such as Hunter Biden or the anonymous whistleblower whose complaint kicked off the House investigations.
Both Texas senators have been part of Republican leadership’s planning for the trial. They were in a small group of senators who met in Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s office earlier this week to talk strategy. The meeting was first reported by Politico and aides familiar with the meeting for both Cornyn and Cruz confirmed it to the Star-Telegram.
At the meeting, senators discussed one of the core issues of contention for how the trial will be run: What if any witnesses will be allowed to testify. Cruz suggested “witness reciprocity,” so that if the Democrats call a witness, the Republicans would call one of their own.
“I think it should be at a bare minimum one-for-one. So if the prosecution brings a witness, if they bring John Bolton, then President Trump can bring a witness — they can bring Hunter Biden,” Cruz explained later.
Bolton is the former Trump White House national security advisor. Hunter Biden, son of the former vice president and current presidential candidate, was on the corporate board of a Ukrainian energy company. Critics say Biden traded on his family’s name to land the lucrative gig.
Cornyn said if witnesses were to be called he liked Cruz’s idea, but “I don’t know whether any additional witnesses would be necessary after we’ve heard the presentation of both sides.”
If the Senate starts calling witnesses in pairs, he said, “You can see how this could extend not just for days and weeks but for months. And particularly if we have an intervening court case over executive privilege or national security privilege.”
“The House had about 100 hours of testimony from 17 witnesses and I presume all of that will be available for the impeachment managers to offer in the Senate trial,” Cornyn said. “So the more I look at this, the more I think the facts really are not all that disputed, it’s just sort of the inferences or the conclusions that people are drawing from them.”
Both senators expressed confidence that the ending is a foregone conclusion.
“I think at the end of this process, these Articles of Impeachment are going to be thrown out. And I think it’s going to end, not with a dismissal, but with a verdict of not guilty,” Cruz said in a Wednesday night Fox News interview.
Cornyn concurred: “We know how the story ends.”
This story was originally published January 16, 2020 at 3:11 PM.