Impeachment trial – live: Trump poured ‘kerosene on the flames’ as Pence family fled for lives, Democrats say

Speculation is mounting that Donald Trump's legal team will not use the full 16 hours available to them to mount a defence of the former president.

According to NBC's political correspondent, this "reflects their outward confidence heading into the trial".

Donald Trump has likened his election defeat, subsequent impeachment trial and build up to 2024 to the period between series of The Apprentice, according to an adviser.

“He’s compared it to that time in between seasons of The Apprentice, building anticipation and wonderment for what’s to come,” the aide told Politico.

Another aide claimed he was enjoying the Twitter ban that was imposed after the Capitol riots: “He finally realises less is more."

A former Trump campaign official has described the ex-president as "Teflon" and said despite the controversy surrounding the violent mob rioting in the Capitol, he has managed to maintain support within the Republican party.

“He’s Teflon, right. It’s been a month since the Capitol riot and I would say, for the most part, the GOP has coalesced back behind him,” the unnamed aide told Politico.

"It’s going to help expose more bad apples that he can primary if any senators vote to convict."

Bill Kristol, a conservative political analyst who previously warned that a second Trump term would be "very dangerous", agreed.

“The story from 3 November on has been an astonishing display of loyalty to Trump and the strength of supporters in the party," he said.

“If you had said [Trump] would fail to recognise the election returns, keep that up, put pressure on secretaries of state and pressure his own vice president to do something unconstitutional, try to call a mob to Washington on 6 January – it’s pretty astonishing and it’s incredible that people kept with him at each step.”

The burning question in American politics right now: Will the party founded by the colleagues of Abraham Lincoln nearly 170 years ago return to being a stable and reasonable right-leaning force of the body politic, or will it remain the bizarre Orange Combover Cult into which it somehow morphed over the past five years? Put another way: Can elected Republicans demonstrate the political savvy to function effectively, even as a minority party that is currently completely shut out of power (thanks to electoral ineptitude of the aforementioned Cult)? Or do they possess the same level of political sophistication as the mob who stormed the Capitol a month ago?

The jury is still out.

Here is George Ajjan's opinion piece.

Missouri senator Josh Hawley has spoken out against Donald Trump's impeachment trial.

"The constitution doesn't allow it," Mr Hawley said in an interview with local news channel KTVO, when asked whether the procedure violates the constitution. 

"The constitution doesn't give the Senate the power to try and convict private citizens. 

“I mean, it just doesn't. You know, the UK, the United Kingdom Parliament try and convict private citizens, they used to do it all the time – but our founders made the choice not to do that, to limit the power of the Senate, and you can see why, because if ex-presidents can be tried and convicted once they are out of office, my goodness, every time we have a switch in party, you're going to see now the majority party coming in and saying lets try the ex-president."

Mr Hawley, who was elected as a senator in Missouri in 2019, faced controversy after he led efforts in Congress to block the certification of votes to confirm Joe Biden as US president in January.

Mr Hawley, an ally of Mr Trump, was the first senator to announce that he would challenge Mr Biden’s victory at the certification of votes in Congress, but was quickly joined by other Republicans including Texas senator Ted Cruz.

Presiding over the trial will not be US Chief Justice John Roberts, who oversaw Donald Trump's first trial, but a Democratic senator who will also get a say in the verdict.

Patrick Leahy of Vermont is president pro tempore of the Senate, meaning he is empowered to preside over Senate sessions in the absence of Vice President Kamala Harris, Reuters reports.

The Constitution requires the Supreme Court chief to preside in presidential impeachments.

When Mr Leahy, who at age 80 is the longest-serving member of the Senate, disclosed last month he would fill that role in Mr Trump's trial, he noted the president pro tempore had historically presided over Senate impeachment trials of non-presidents.

Mr Leahy, a liberal lawmaker, has vowed to be fair, but some Republicans and Trump's lawyers have criticised the arrangement.

"Now, instead of the Chief Justice, the trial will be overseen by a biased and partisan Senator who will purportedly also act as a juror while ruling on issues that arise during trial," Mr Trump's lawyers wrote in a legal brief filed on Monday.

Joe Biden has a "full schedule" this week and won't be tuning in to watch Donald Trump's trial, White House press secretary Jen Psaki has said.

"I don't expect that he's going to be, you know, posturing or commenting on this through the course of the week," she said.

Instead, he will be focused on pushing his pandemic relief package, visiting the National Institutes of Health, touching base at the Pentagon and tackling his other duties at a time of crisis, the White House said.

But with the eyes of the country on the trial, it will be difficult for Mr Biden to avoid.

Here is the story.

The Justice Department of the new Biden administration has dropped a lawsuit against Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a former adviser to Melania Trump who was accused of breaking a non-disclosure agreement with her tell-all book about the first lady.

Ms Wolkoff, the author of Melania and Me, worked as an unpaid adviser to Ms Trump from January 2017 to February 2018, and was accused of violating an agreement that she signed in 2017.

She had left the job after The New York Times reported that a firm founded by Wolkoff received $26m (£18.8m) to help organise a Trump inauguration event. 

Read the story here.

Donald Trump has tasked a former district attorney most known for declining to prosecute Bill Cosby — then suing one of his accusers — and a lawyer who has boasted about representing “all sorts of reputed mobster figures” to lead his defence in the impeachment trial.

The two controversial additions to the former president’s impeachment team were reported during the weekend after five lawyers parted ways with Mr Trump over apparent disagreements about the trial strategy.

Read the story here.

It is likely to be more than a week.

The trial opens on Tuesday with four hours of debate on whether the hearing is even constitutional.

The Senate will then vote on whether to dismiss the charge against Mr Trump. If that vote fails, as expected, the House managers will begin their arguments on Wednesday.

Both prosecutors and the defence have up to 16 hours to make their arguments, with no more than eight hours of arguments per day. Senators will be permitted to ask questions and there could be further procedural votes.

That is likely to continue into Thursday.

Mr Trump's lawyers are expected to begin their arguments on Friday, which will last into Saturday.

That means a final vote on Mr Trump's conviction will likely not happen until next week.