White House counsel Pat Cipollone was not involved in writing President Trump’s bizarre letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi blasting the impeachment vote.
Trump called the impeachment a “crusade,” an “unprecedented and unconstitutional abuse of power” and a “spiteful” “election-nullification scheme.”
Trump said Pelosi “cheapened the importance of the very ugly word, impeachment” by “declaring open war on American Democracy. ”
“You dare to invoke the Founding Fathers in pursuit of this election-nullification scheme — yet your spiteful actions display unfettered contempt for America’s founding and your egregious conduct threatens to destroy that which our Founders pledged their very lives to build,” Trump wrote.
“It is a terrible thing you are doing, but you will have to live with it, not I!” he wrote.
“More due process was afforded to those accused in the Salem Witch Trials,” he added.
Stephen Miller helped draft letter:
Cipollone, who will lead the White House defense of the president, was not involved in the drafting of the letter, according to The New York Times.
Instead, the letter was drafted by Office of Legislative Affairs head Eric Ueland, senior adviser Stephen Miller, and Michael Williams, an aide to acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney.
“I am told White House lawyers were cut out of the process of drafting the President's six-page letter to Pelosi,” confirmed ABC News’ Jon Karl. “At the direction of the President, the letter was drafted by Eric Ueland, Stephen Miller and Mulvaney aide Michael Williams. Cipollone saw it after it was drafted.”
Trump blasted over letter:
“If a juror in Trump’s coming impeachment trial had no other evidence except this letter, it would provide ample grounds for impeachment. Trump openly denies the Congress’s constitutional prerogative, and makes plain his mental unfitness for the job,” wrote New York Magazine’s Jon Chait.
"I think Donald Trump makes his mental fitness a part of the issue every single day,” added former Republican strategist Rick Wilson. “You read that letter that he sent today to the House and it's just six pages of pure crazy, weapons-grade nuts.”
