House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff judged on Tuesday that if the Republican-led Senate does not agree to Democrats’ demand to allow new witnesses and evidence in the impeachment trial without a vote, President Trump will be considered guilty even if he is acquitted.
“If the Senate and the Senate leadership… will not allow the calling of witnesses or the presentation of documents,” Schiff told reporters, “if [Senate Majority Leader Mitch] McConnell makes this the first impeachment trial in history without witnesses or documents, it will not prove the president innocent.
“It will merely prove the Senate guilty of working with the president to obstruct the truth from coming out, so I do think that by structuring the trial this way, it furthers our case that what’s going on here really is a cover-up of evidence to the American people.”
Schiff complained that McConnell’s rules governing the Senate trial “make it impossible to hear a fair trial” — as if the Democrats care about that.