Jason Crow is a star now. Smart, confident and tough, this Army Ranger is making Colorado proud. He’s a skilled Denver lawyer working his heart out for the good of our country. Crow’s a cinch to win again in his CD6.
Expect House Impeachment Manager Crow to campaign for others.
Cory Gardner’s got a great seat to watch Jason Crow. It’s a better view than Mitch McConnell’s atrocious high camera angles accentuating lawyers’ bald spots. Gardner’s got great hair, even as it grays, but soon, he’ll have to do more than just sit there looking pretty.
Sen. Gardner’s got to take a stand. He can be an American hero. Trump’s been caught cheating to win an election. How can there not be witnesses? Can we please hear Bolton? Mulvaney? Lev? Igor?
Can senators please listen to the 2018 dinner talk between Parnas, Fruman and Trump? Can we see hidden documents?Can we please follow the money, and all the roads that lead to Putin?
Suddenly, Jason Crow looms large in Colorado’s Senate race. Cory Gardner can expect a regular diet of Crow as he gets questioned back home in Colorado (if he takes questions). Saying POTUS did nothing wrong just won’t work here, yet anything else may cause Trump to tweet smear.
Some day, this Trump and Gardner bromance will end badly. It may as well happen now. It’s also the only way Gardner might win. If he loses, Cory Gardner could practice law in Colorado. What great continuing legal education he got last week from Jason Crow and the House impeachment managers.
READ: Colorado Sun opinion columnists.
This Senate trial is unlike any trial I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen a few. It’s more like a talk show where anything you find online is admissible.
How do you get today’s news into evidence? Just say it out loud. Click it on screen. The Senate is full of attorneys, but not one has made any kind of objection, as Tom Harkin did in 1999. It’s strange to hear lawyers speak so long in trial without any interruption.
Adam Schiff is a legal and political superstar now. He’s delivered several of the best speeches in American history. Some envious senators must be perturbed that a House member accomplished this in their hallowed chambers. Schiff has complete command of the facts and speaks with powerful credibility.
Schiff’s in an oratorical zone few trial lawyers have ever achieved. Even Lindsey Graham had to confess this truth. No wonder Donald Trump has consistently demeaned and demonized this L.A. lawyer who represents the greatest threat to his presidency.
This president’s projectionism and mobsterism were on full display in his menacing Sunday tweet, “Shifty Adam Schiff is a CORRUPT POLITICIAN, and probably a very sick man. He has not paid the price, yet, for what he has done to our Country!”
New York Rep. Hakeem Jefferies is another sensational lawyer, with his own authoritative and mesmerizing speaking style. Other House impeachment managers were good, but House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler was not. Nadler’s insulting of senators during motions hearing and before the trial even started was not helpful.
However, it does seem Sens. Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and others feign outrage whenever possible this trial. They acted so piqued when Chairman Schiff riffed about the CBS report “Republican senator defectors’ heads on pikes” threat attributed to a White House insider.
Dost thou protest too much, senators? Are you just looking for an excuse to do the wrong thing? In Colorado, let’s name this kerfuffle “Pikes Pique.”
Alan Dershowitz is Trump’s ace in the hole. The Dersh is not boring, and he will tell the Senate and America that the abuse of power charge is too vague and unconstitutional. Serious constitutional scholars disagree, but that won’t stop the GOP.
Who really cares about Ukraine? That’s what Trump enforcer and big bully Mike Pompeo just asked a respected NPR reporter.
And who really cares about Impeachment Article Two, Obstruction of Congress? By letting such obstruction stand, the world’s most exclusive club will surrender its own power, and become glorified Mar-a-Lago members. Trump will make all the rules. There goes Congress.
Borrowing from MacBeth, perhaps this impeachment trial’s been “but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
But for those of us who’ve gone all in decrying Trump for his Ukrainian Shakedown, it’s not nothing. It’s something that will define our legacies.
Our side is the right side. If we survive Trump, and I expect we will, history will say so. I’m with Jason Crow and those who know this president has crossed the line. What side are you on, Cory Gardner?
Craig Silverman is a former Denver chief deputy DA who also has worked in the media for decades. Craig is columnist at large for The Colorado Sun. He practices law at the Denver law firm of Springer & Steinberg, P.C.
The Colorado Sun is a nonpartisan news organization, and the opinions of columnists and editorial writers do not reflect the opinions of the newsroom. Read our ethics policy for more on The Sun’s opinion policy and submit columns, suggested writers and more to opinion@coloradosun.com.