Watch: Ari Melber mercilessly fact-checks Donald Trump's impeachment lawyer on live TV
December 21, 2022
MSNBC's Ari Melber offered a blistering assessment of former President Donald Trump's impeachment lawyer's distortion of hard facts. During a two-part segment on Tuesday's edition of "The Beat with Ari Melber," the MSNBC host recalled recent remarks made by Trump lawyer David Shoen.
"Trump's insurrection impeachment lawyer David Shoen insisted that Trump opposed that violence, that Trump's words were merely encouraging those armed fans to engage in peaceful and civic action, not storming the Capitol violently," Melber noted.
The segment then shifted to a clip of Shoen laying out his argument in Trump's defense. "President Trump did not incite the horrific, terrible riots of January 6," Shoen said. "The violence and looting goes against the law and order message he conveyed to every citizen of the United States throughout his presidency, including on January 6. You knew what the President really meant. He meant that the crowd should demand action from members of Congress and support primary challenges to those who don't do what he considered to be right."
Melber quickly pushed back with hard facts refuting Shoen's claims. "Did then President Trump's request boil down to supporting only primary challenges?" Melber asked as he added, "That is not what those now convicted Trump fans believed."
He continued, "They were chanting, the president sent them. It's not what the militias believed. It's not what top Trump aides believed, as they wrote down and admitted plots to overturn the lawful election result, not just support primary candidates in the future. And apparently, it is not what Trump believed."
Melber went on to recall what transpired in the aftermath. "After that trial... After that remark was made, Donald Trump went on to vow pardons for the criminal trespassers and violent criminals, a lawless endorsement of their actual crimes on his apparent behalf. He said if he wins again, he would issue those pardons in the future."
"So whatever one thought or claimed, then, this is the kind of defense that did not age well, especially against the over 150 pages of new evidence released Monday, with more of this January 6 report slated to come out tomorrow," Melber said. "If Trump aides or Trump himself face indictments on this evidence, they'll need a lot more than talk of primary challenges or that he always supported law and order as his fans battered police, and then he vowed to pardon them after they did."
The second installment of the segment features Melber's one-on-one discussion with Shoen. Melber didn't mince words when he lambasted Shoen for his refusal to actually listen to the facts and discuss real evidence.
"When you keep attacking Process and the committee, you seem like you don't want to discuss the evidence," Melber said, adding, "And that makes you look a little bit like some of these were recalcitrant witnesses where nobody wants to discuss what happened. It's all in the open. I'll take a listen. You brought up the big lie. Let's get into that. Rudy Giuliani admitted under oath he did participate with this committee, and he admitted under oath, we're going to get into this tonight that the Dominion machines didn't steal anything, even though he said the opposite. Bill Barr, who I think you know is a Republican lawyer and somewhat good standing in the party, said it was all BS."
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