华盛顿——前总统唐纳德·特朗普宣布成立新的弹劾法律辩护小组，就在一天前，有消息透露，他已经与早些时候的一批律师分道扬镳，离参议院审判只有一周多一点时间。
代表特朗普的两人将是辩护律师大卫·舍恩(David Schoen)，他是一名经常参加电视法律评论员，以及布鲁斯·卡斯特(Bruce Castor)，他是宾夕法尼亚州的前地区检察官，因决定不在性犯罪案件中起诉演员比尔·科斯比而面临批评。
周日，两位律师都通过特朗普的办公室发表声明，表示他们很荣幸接受这份工作。
“我们宪法的力量将受到前所未有的考验。它结实而有弹性。这是一份为时代而写的文件，它将再次战胜党派之争，并将永远如此，”卡斯特说，他在2000年至2008年期间担任费城以外蒙哥马利县的地区检察官。
随着特朗普弹劾审判的临近，这一宣布旨在促进特朗普辩护团队的稳定感。这位前总统一直在努力雇佣和留住愿意代表他的律师，指控他煽动了美国国会大厦的致命暴乱。1月6日，当立法者开会证明乔·拜登的选举胜利时，一群忠于他的人冲进了国会。
这与他的第一次弹劾审判形成了鲜明对比，当时特朗普的高调律师团队包括该国最著名的刑事辩护律师之一艾伦·德尔绍维茨(Alan Dershowitz)，以及白宫律师帕特·西珀隆(Pat Cipollone)和曾在最高法院辩论过案件的杰伊·塞库罗(Jay Sekulow)。
特朗普的团队最初宣布，南卡罗来纳州律师布奇·鲍尔斯(Buchbowers)将在共和党参议员的介绍下领导他的法律团队。林赛·格雷厄姆。但由于法律策略上的分歧，该团队在周末解散了。
一位熟悉他们想法的人说，鲍尔斯和另一位南卡罗来纳州律师黛博拉·栗林诚一郎离开了团队，因为特朗普希望他们使用基于选举欺诈指控的辩护，而律师们不愿意这样做。此人无权公开谈论此事，并要求匿名
特朗普是美国历史上第一位两次被弹劾的总统，共和党人和特朗普的助手已经明确表示，他们打算在审判中进行简单的辩论:特朗普的审判定于2月8日的那一周进行，因为他不再任职，所以违宪。
特朗普顾问杰森·米勒表示:“民主党弹劾一位已经离任的总统的努力完全违反宪法，对我们的国家非常不利。”。
然而，许多法律学者表示，尽管特朗普已经离开白宫，但弹劾审判没有任何障碍。一种观点认为，早于美国宪法的州宪法允许官员离任后进行弹劾。宪法起草者也没有明确禁止这种做法。
卡斯特是共和党人，他是宾夕法尼亚州人口第三多的县的当选地区检察官，他在2004年的一次性接触中决定不起诉科斯比。他在2015年再次竞选这一职位，他在科斯比案中的判决是击败他的民主党人用来反对他的一个关键问题。
卡斯特说，他个人认为科斯比应该被逮捕，但证据不足以证明这一案件超出了合理的怀疑范围。
2004年，卡斯特竞选州司法部长失败。2016年，他成为该州四面楚歌的司法部长(民主党人凯瑟琳·凯恩)的最高副手，因为她面临泄露受保护的调查信息以诽谤竞争对手并就此向大陪审团撒谎的指控。她被判有罪，让卡斯特担任该州代理司法部长几天。
就在爱泼斯坦在纽约监狱自杀的前几天，舍恩会见了金融家杰弗里·爱泼斯坦，讨论加入他的性交易指控辩护小组。
在去年接受亚特兰大犹太时报采访时，舍恩说，在斯通受审之前，特朗普的同事罗杰·斯通也找过他，说他是团队的一员，后来他被保留下来处理他的上诉。特朗普为斯通减刑，然后赦免了他。舍恩在采访中坚称，针对斯通的案件“非常不公平，而且被政治化了。”
周日晚上，舍恩和卡斯特都没有回复寻求置评的电话。
Trump names 2 lawyers to impeachment defense team
WASHINGTON -- Former President Donald Trump announced a new impeachment legal defense team just one day after it was revealed that he had parted ways with an earlier set of attorneys with just over a week to go before his Senate trial.
The two representing Trump will be defense lawyer David Schoen, a frequent television legal commentator, and Bruce Castor, a former district attorney in Pennsylvania who has faced criticism for his decision to not charge actor Bill Cosby in a sex crimes case.
Both attorneys issued statements through Trump's office on Sunday saying that they were honored to take the job.
“The strength of our Constitution is about to be tested like never before in our history. It is strong and resilient. A document written for the ages, and it will triumph over partisanship yet again, and always,” said Castor, who served as district attorney for Montgomery County, outside of Philadelphia, from 2000 to 2008.
The announcement was intended to promote a sense of stability surrounding the Trump defense team as his impeachment trial nears. The former president has struggled to hire and retain attorneys willing to represent him against charges that he incited the deadly riot at the U.S. Capitol, which happened when a mob of loyalists stormed Congress as lawmakers met Jan. 6 to certify Joe Biden's electoral victory.
That's a contrast from his first impeachment trial, when Trump's high-profile team of attorneys included Alan Dershowitz, one of the best-known criminal defense lawyers in the country, as well as White House counsel Pat Cipollone, and Jay Sekulow, who has argued cases before the Supreme Court.
Trump’s team had initially announced that Butch Bowers, a South Carolina lawyer, would lead his legal team after an introduction from Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham. But that team unraveled over the weekend due to differences over legal strategy.
One person familiar with their thinking said Bowers and another South Carolina lawyer, Deborah Barbier, left the team because Trump wanted them to use a defense that relied on allegations of election fraud, and the lawyers were not willing to do so. The person was not authorized to speak publicly about the situation and requested anonymity
Republicans and aides to Trump, the first president to be impeached twice in American history, have made clear that they intend to make a simple argument in the trial: Trump’s trial, scheduled for the week of Feb. 8, is unconstitutional because he is no longer in office.
“The Democrats’ efforts to impeach a president who has already left office is totally unconstitutional and so bad for our country," Trump adviser Jason Miller has said.
Many legal scholars, however, say there is no bar to an impeachment trial despite Trump having left the White House. One argument is that state constitutions that predate the U.S. Constitution allowed impeachment after officials left office. The Constitution’s drafters also did not specifically bar the practice.
Castor, a Republican who was the elected district attorney of Pennsylvania’s third-most populated county, decided against charging Cosby in a 2004 sexual encounter. He ran for the job again in 2015, and his judgment in the Cosby case was a key issue used against him by the Democrat who defeated him.
Castor has said that he personally thought Cosby should have been arrested, but that the evidence wasn’t strong enough to prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt.
In 2004, Castor ran for state attorney general unsuccessfully. In 2016, he became the top lieutenant to the state’s embattled attorney general — Kathleen Kane, a Democrat — as she faced charges of leaking protected investigative information to smear a rival and lying to a grand jury about it. She was convicted, leaving Castor as the state’s acting attorney general for a few days.
Schoen met with financier Jeffrey Epstein about joining his defense team on sex trafficking charges just days before Epstein killed himself in a New York jail.
In an interview with the Atlanta Jewish Times last year, Schoen said he had also been approached by Trump associate Roger Stone before Stone's trial about being part of the team and that he was was later retained to handle his appeal. Trump commuted Stone's sentence and then pardoned him. Schoen maintained in the interview that the case against Stone was “very unfair and politicized.”
Neither Schoen nor Castor returned phone messages seeking comment Sunday evening.
