The defense, like the House managers, was allotted 24 hours over as many as three days to present its side.
Mr. Cipollone opened the arguments with a promise: “We’re going to be very respectful of your time,” he told the senators, vowing to take “about two to three hours at most, and to be out of here by one o’clock at the latest.”
Just after noon, with nearly an hour left to spare, Mr. Cipollone made his closing remarks.
The strategy appears to have two goals: Remind senators of how much repetition there was in the House managers’ case. And perhaps to earn some good will from the senators as they put on a case that apparently will be much shorter.
The House managers dropped off a 28,578-page record of the trial evidence to the Senate.
Their argument finished, the House managers made one last stab on Saturday morning to underscore the power of their impeachment case by marching from the House to the Senate with boxes filled with 28,578 pages of transcripts and other evidence collected during their inquiry.
Shortly after 9:45 a.m., the impeachment managers, led by Mr. Schiff, the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, emerged from Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office and walked to the Senate as their aides wheeled four carts of white bankers boxes stuffed with binders of documents behind them.
“The record delivered today presents a mountain of evidence showing the president has committed the impeachable offenses that the House has charged — abuse of power and obstruction of Congress — and he should be removed from office,” the managers said in a statement. “The factual and legal record laid out by the House managers has yet to be substantively rebutted by President Trump or his lawyers, who have instead sought to hide behind novel and frivolous legal theories.”
This week, Republicans repeatedly rejected Democratic attempts to subpoena more documents and call new witnesses. That question will come up again after arguments from both sides and questions from senators.
Peter Baker, Maggie Haberman, Sharon LaFraniere and Michael D. Shear contributed reporting.