President Donald Trump's legal team is sending the Senate a fiery response to its impeachment summons, outlining the defenses it expects to use in the upcoming trial.
Trump's Saturday answer to the Senate's formal impeachment summons calls the two articles of impeachment passed by the House last month a dangerous attack on the right of the American people to freely choose their president.
The document offers a taste of the rhetoric expected to be deployed by the president's defenders in the Senate.
This is a brazen and unlawful attempt to overturn the results of the 2016 election and interfere with the 2020 election, now just months away," the filing states.
Two people close to the president's legal team outlined the filing in advance on the condition of anonymity.
Trump's legal team, led by White House counsel Pat Cipollone and Trump personal lawyer Jay Sekulow, is challenging the impeachment on both procedural and constitutional grounds, claiming Trump has been mistreated by House Democrats and that he did nothing wrong.
Trump's attorneys argue that the articles of impeachment are unconstitutional in and of themselves and invalid because they don't allege a crime.
Trump was impeached by the House on one count each of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
Under the Constitution impeachment is a political, not a criminal process, and the president can be removed from office is found guilty of whatever lawmakers consider high crimes and misdemeanors.
Trump's answer to the summons is the first salvo in what will be several rounds of arguments before the trial is expected to formally begin on Tuesday.
The House is set to file its brief outlining its case for impeachment Saturday. Trump will file a more detailed legal brief on Monday, and the House will be able to respond to the Trump filing on Tuesday.
House Democrats were preparing to outline their case for removing President Donald Trump from office in a legal brief due Saturday, as opposing sides in the impeachment case look ahead to the opening of the historic trial in the Senate.
Trump on Friday appointed several nationally known lawyers to the team that will defend him in the proceedings, set to open Tuesday afternoon.
The submission of the legal brief, due by 5 pm Saturday, follows the latest revelations in the case against Trump.
Democrats on Friday released more information documents, text messages, audio and photos turned over by Lev Parnas, an indicted associate of Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani.
The release included multiple photos of Parnas, a Soviet-born Florida businessman, posing with Giuliani or Trump or Donald Trump Jr., the president's son.
It included messages between Parnas and a staff member for Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif., a Trump ally who opposes the president's impeachment by the House.
Parnas appeared to be connecting the staff member to Ukrainian officials who pushed unfounded corruption allegations against former Vice President Joe Biden.
The documents also raised more questions about the surveillance and security of former Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch. In them, an unidentified individual with a
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