Ms. Feinstein asked, “Is that true?”
It was a softball, but a strategic one.
“There is in fact overwhelming evidence that the president withheld the military aid directly to get a personal political benefit to help his individual political campaign,” said Representative Jason Crow of Colorado, one of the House managers.
Throughout the day, Democrats repeatedly asked whether senators could reach a verdict without hearing testimony from the president’s former national security adviser, John R. Bolton, and other presidential aides involved in Ukraine foreign policy.
This was not a hard one for the House managers, either.
“There is no way to have a fair trial without witnesses,” Mr. Schiff said. “And when you have a witness who is as plainly relevant as John Bolton — who goes to the heart of the most serious and egregious of the president’s misconduct, who has volunteered to come and testify — to turn him away, to look the other way, I think is deeply at odds with being an impartial juror.”
Trump defense says Bolton has ‘all the nation’s secrets.’
In what did not appear to be an intentional taunt to the Democrats, one of Mr. Trump’s lawyers, Patrick Philbin, said what most in the Senate chamber already knew: “John Bolton was the national security adviser to the president. He has all the nation’s secrets.”
Democrats want Mr. Bolton to testify about what he knew of Mr. Trump’s attempts to pressure Ukraine. And almost all the Republicans want to make sure that Mr. Bolton does not have the opportunity to do so.
Once the question-and-answer portion of the trial is complete, senators are expected to vote Friday on whether to hear new witnesses.
Mr. Philbin argued that if the Senate subpoenaed Mr. Bolton to testify, he would likely be unable to comply because Mr. Trump could claim executive privilege, but Democrats disagree.