Donald Trump's sensational second impeachment trial has detailed how supporters stormed the Capitol building on Jan 6
Credit: AFP
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Going into Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial everyone thought they knew the evidence inside out already. Well, we didn’t know the half of it.
Democrat prosecutors caught everybody by surprise with a barrage of new information, mainly previously unseen footage from CCTV cameras inside the US Capitol.
The video, seen below, was stunning. It showed Mike Pence and his family being rushed to safety as rioters, who wanted to hang him for treason, closed in.
Senator Mitt Romney almost walked into a murderous mob. As did Chuck Schumer, the Democrat leader in the Senate.
Nancy Pelosi’s staff could be seen ducking into a room. Minutes later rioters arrived and tried to break the door down.
Members of Congress were led down a corridor to safety, hand on the shoulder of the one in front. Some passed the prone form of a rioter being held at gunpoint by police.
There was audio, too, of desperate police officers screaming for back-up that didn’t come.
"We’ve been flanked! We’ve lost the line!" they yelled, to no avail.
New bodycam footage, below, showed officers being pummelled with bats and flagpoles.
The Democrat prosecutors put together an extraordinarily professional case to open the trial.
They argued not just that Mr Trump was reckless in directing his followers to the Capitol on Jan 6.
Instead, they sought to show that he cultivated a mob over a period of months, then deliberately aimed it at the seat of US democracy, with violent intent, to stop the certification of the election.
In other words, he knew what was going to happen.
According to the prosecution there was, within the mob, a premeditated plot to "assassinate" Mike Pence, Mr Trump’s own vice president, who was overseeing the certification process and refusing to block it.
They showed video of a large group chanting "Hang Mike Pence!" and pictures of a makeshift wooden gallows that they erected on Capitol Hill.
A noose is seen on makeshift gallows outside the Capitol building
Credit: AFP
Mr Trump’s followers, the prosecution argued, genuinely planned to hunt down and lynch the vice president of the United States. If Mrs Pelosi, the Speaker of the House, had been found, she would have been murdered too, they said.
Considering senators are the jury, perhaps the most persuasive part of the prosecution case was how close the rioters came to the politicians.
They were within 100ft of Mr Pence. Some of them were just 58 paces down a corridor from members of Congress.
Impeachment -Capitol riot map 02
Video showed Mr Schumer hurrying down a corridor to escape, then having to turn and run the other way.
Mr Romney was seen on CCTV walking alone down a corridor, not realising he was heading towards the mob.
A police officer spotted him, guided him to safety, and then went to confront the rioters.
The trial was the first time Mr Romney had been told how near he was to danger.
During a break in proceedings, he said: "It tears at your heart and brings tears to your eyes. I was very fortunate. I look forward to thanking him [the police officer] when I next see him."
Mr Trump’s lawyers had suggested the nine Democrat prosecutors would "trip over each other" presenting their case.
Instead, they produced a clear narrative, and a multimedia timeline which made sense of the flood of images everyone has seen on social media.
It linked Mr Trump’s actions to those of the mob, and also showed how for hours he failed to tell them to stop.
Members of the far-Right organisation The Proud Boys were in the vanguard of the mob, and the first people to break into the Capitol wielded Trump flags, CCTV footage showed.
The prosecution’s case was that all senators – Democrat and Republican alike – had been at risk.
"President Trump left everyone in this Capitol for dead," the prosecutors said. "He was coming for you, for Democratic and Republican senators. He was coming for all of us."
Those same senators, who will decide Mr Trump’s fate, sat silently, and apparently riveted.
A multimedia timeline clearly laid out events of the day, including tweets from the then-US president
Credit: AP
The presentation included stills from video footage of rioters breaching the Capitol building
Credit: AP
But the possibility of Mr Trump being convicted remains remote. It requires a two-thirds majority of the Senate, meaning 17 of the 50 Republicans would have to join the 50 Democrats.
John Thune, a Republican from South Dakota, said the prosecution was "very effective" and "pretty compelling". He added: "I think they’ve done a good job of connecting the dots."
But Senator Josh Hawley of Missouri, a strong supporter of Mr Trump, said: "Nothing new here for me at the end of the day."
Indeed, some Republicans may feel the prosecution overreached by trying to link Mr Trump to a plot involving the murder of his own vice president.
Democrats know a conviction in the Senate is elusive, and their made-for-TV presentation was also produced with the court of public opinion in mind.
They want to shock the American public – particularly Republican voters – so much that, even after an acquittal, Mr Trump cannot gather enough support to run for the presidency again.
Lisa Murkowski, a Republican senator and juror, suggested they may have succeeded.
She said: "I don’t see how after the American public sees the whole story laid out here, this whole scenario laid out before us… I don’t see how Donald Trump could be re-elected to the presidency again."
Mr Trump is well aware of the Democrat strategy, and furious with his own lawyers who made a lackluster start to the trial.
Peter Navarro, a former adviser to Mr Trump, said he had spoken to the ex-president by telephone and suggested he fire his lawyers, or risk losing support in the country.
Mr Navarro said: "If he doesn’t make a mid-course correction here he’s going to lose this Super Bowl."
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