Thread by @TheViewFromLL2

Cipollone, to kick off the day, is promising to prove that all of this in Ukraine was really just about "burden sharing" with Europe. And also that Trump has been really hard on Russia.

Right now, President Trump is somewhere in the White House complaining about how boring his opening defense from Cipollone was.

Purpura is technically much better at this then Cipollone, but so far it's mostly just been complaints about Democrats and promises to show unspecified evidence that will be really compelling, he swears.

Purpura says that Trump talks about two things in the July 25 call: burden sharing and corruption.

Trump repeated this same obvious lie in his briefs. Apparently they don't think the senators will read the transcript and realize that, of course, corruption was never mentioned.

Purpura's complaints about Democrats never talking about the javelin sales makes me wonder again if it was a misstep for Democrats to decide not to make the 2018 quid pro quo part of their case. There is substantial evidence Trump already used javelins to blackmail Ukraine.

The Ukrainians clearly learned of the freeze on assistance before Politico did, but this whole line of argument is meaningless. It is undisputed that the Ukrainians were informed in September, after the freeze was public, that the aid was contingent on a Biden announcement.

Purpura: 'There is no evidence anywhere that aid was contingent on investigations.'

Given that the President's Chief of Staff went live on camera and declared the quid pro quo absolutely did occur, this is basically a declaration from the White House that reality doesn't matter.

Sekulow up now. Arguing that Trump made the right call by rejecting the advice of his intelligence agencies, and seeking a different opinion from another source he trusts – which, in this case, I suppose is a reference to Giuliani?

Oh wow. Sekulow is straight up arguing that U.S. agencies are untrustworthy liars, and Trump should have no obligation to rely on the probably false claims made by the agencies he oversees.

Sekulow is now arguing that Ukraine interfered in the 2016 election. Gross. Inexcusable.

Sekulow is... now implying that Mueller was investigating Ukraine for election interference? Not quite sure what his point was, if it wasn't that.

Sekulow has been making a lengthy, detailed case that, in fact, Ukraine has a corruption problem. And that "we're acting as if there was a magic wand" that had magically fixed all corruption problems in Ukraine.

This is the most boring strawman.

Sekulow quotes Democrats saying that the idea Trump cares about corruption is laughable, and then, repeats twice that "Dr. Hill testified that eliminating corruption in Ukraine" was a central plank of our Ukraine policy. I guess he thinks that proves something.

Philbin: the idea that Trump simply refused to cooperate with subpoenas without a legal justification "is simply not true."

Philbin notes that Trump's team specifically stated that they thought the House's subpoenas were unlawful. So therefore there was no "blanket defiance."

Philbin notes that Democrats have said Trump never invoked executive privilege.

For a moment, I was super curious about where this was going – how could he possibly refute that. But then he concludes that this is "technically true but misleading."

Philbin now arguing that the House impeachment power can only be exercised after a House vote in favor of invoking them. There is literally no authority for this argument.

Took them a bit to get there, but Philbin is now attacking the whistleblower. Though, possibly only as a set up to attack Schiff.

Trying to remember if the word "Biden" has come up even once today.