A lead impeachment defense lawyer for former President Donald Trump asked Senate leaders to suspend his client’s trial during the Jewish Sabbath.
In a letter obtained by the New York Times, David Schoen requested the trial, should it still be taking place, stop at sundown on Friday, the beginning of the Sabbath, before returning Sunday.
“I apologize for the inconvenience my request that impeachment proceedings not be conducted during the Jewish Sabbath undoubtedly will cause other people involved in the proceedings,” Schoen said in the letter. “The practices and prohibitions are mandatory for me, however; so, respectfully, I have no choice but to make this request.”
The letter was sent to the Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont, a Democrat who, as president pro tempore, is set to preside over the trial.
“We respect their request and of course will accommodate it,” Justin Goodman, a spokesman for Schumer, said in a statement obtained by the Washington Examiner. “Conversations with the relevant parties about the structure of the trial continue.”
A trial that concludes before the Friday Sabbath would be much shorter than Trump’s first Senate impeachment. In early 2020, the trial lasted nearly three weeks, starting on Jan. 16 and ending in acquittal on Feb. 5.
The House impeached Trump last month on a charge of incitement of insurrection. The Senate trial is set to start next week. The following Monday is Washington’s Birthday, a federal holiday widely known as Presidents Day, and was set to be a week in which senators were expected to return to their home states.
Lawmakers from both parties are hoping for a quick trial, set to begin Tuesday.
Democrats, eager to charge forward with President Biden’s agenda, want to pass a $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package and confirm the president’s remaining Cabinet members.
Senate Republicans are looking to move past the events that led to Trump’s second impeachment, mainly Trump’s speech to a “Stop the Steal” rally and the Capitol riot that took place on Jan. 6.
Schoen is part of a second group of lawyers who agreed to represent Trump after an earlier team departed reportedly because they would not commit to defending Trump using his claims of election fraud.
In a strategy outlined Wednesday, Trump’s lawyers argued that impeaching a former president is unconstitutional and said his speech at the rally, in which he implored supporters to march to the U.S. Capitol to protest the results of the 2020 election that lawmakers were affirming, did not directly cause the deadly events that followed.
On Thursday, Schoen and Bruce Castor, another Trump lawyer, accused Democrats of “playing games” after House impeachment managers invited Trump to testify in person at the trial.
The lawyers dismissed the request as a “PR stunt” but did not rule out the possibility.
