US ex-leader rebuilds trial legal team

Trump hires key lawyers for battle in Senate as Republican rifts play out

WASHINGTON－Former US president Donald Trump announced on Sunday that he had picked two lawyers to head his defense team just a week before his historic second impeachment trial, as Republicans braced for a battle over the future of their party.

Trump's Senate trial is due to start on Feb 9, but he had reportedly parted ways with several members of his initial legal team just a day before his announcement.

His lead lawyers, David Schoen and Bruce L. Castor, are "highly respected trial lawyers" with backgrounds in criminal law and defense, Trump said in a statement.

Schoen has represented Trump ally Roger Stone, and said he had been in discussions to join the legal team for Jeffrey Epstein in 2019 days before the US financier killed himself while in jail on allegations of trafficking underage girls for sex.

Castor previously served as the district attorney for Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, where he declined to push forward with a case when US comedian Bill Cosby was accused of sexual assault by Andrea Constand.

The case moved forward under Castor's successor and Cosby was convicted in 2018.

Schoen had already been working with the defense team, and both he and Castor "agree that this impeachment is unconstitutional", Trump's statement said.

The trial of the former president for alleged "incitement of insurrection" over the Jan 6 storming of the US Capitol by his supporters has exposed a rift between Trump loyalists who dominate the Republican Party and its moderate wing.

"The Senate trial ... is going to call all Republicans to take a position more clearly," Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson told ABC's This Week.

He added: "We've got to have a regard for those people that supported Donald Trump. ... But at the same time, we don't want to gloss over the terrible actions that happened at the Capitol."

Trump looks increasingly likely to avoid conviction due to party support in the Senate－where all but five Republicans already backed an attempt to throw out the case on constitutional grounds.

But the trial is still sure to see battle lines drawn over who controls the party following Trump's first-term defeat.

On Jan 6, Trump gave a fiery speech exhorting his supporters to march on the US Capitol to overturn the election results.

The protesters then violently stormed the Capitol building in scenes that shocked the world.

"The president's comments that day were partly responsible for what happened, for the horrible violence," Republican Senator Rob Portman told CNN's State of the Union.

"What he did was wrong and inexcusable. I am a juror. I'm going to keep an open mind as we go through this (trial). But I do think that this constitutionality issue has to be addressed. We would be convicting a private citizen, someone who's out of office. That sets up a precedent."

Adam Kinzinger, one of 10 Republicans in the House of Representatives to vote for impeachment last month, said on Sunday that Trump was "desperate to continue to look like he's leading the party".

"We need to quit being the party that even an iota defends an insurrection, a dead police officer and other dead Americans on the Capitol," Kinzinger told NBC.

Kinzinger has launched a new political action committee seeking to raise funds to challenge the Trump wing of the party.

Downsized relief plan?

Meanwhile, 10 moderate Republican senators urged US President Joe Biden on Sunday to significantly downsize his sweeping $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package to win bipartisan support as Democrats in Congress prepared to push ahead with his plan this week.

Biden responded by inviting the Republican lawmakers to the White House this week for talks, his spokeswoman Jen Psaki said, even as he continues to seek a comprehensive, large-scale measure. Earlier, a top White House economic adviser signaled willingness to discuss the ideas raised by the Republicans, who have floated a $600 billion alternative.

Agencies via Xinhua