Ken Starr, Pam Bondi and Alan Dershowitz have joined the president’s defence team
WASHINGTON, Jan 18 (NNN-AGENCIES) —US President Donald Trump’s defence team in his Senate trial will include special prosecutors from President Bill Clinton’s impeachment.
He will be represented by Ken Starr and Robert Ray, who investigated Clinton, and Alan Dershowitz, whose past clients include OJ Simpson.
White House counsel Pat Cipollone and Trump’s personal lawyer Jay Sekulow will lead the team.
Opening statements in the Trump impeachment trial will begin next week.
Starr was the US Department of Justice independent counsel who investigated the Whitewater affair, a scandal-plagued mid-1980s land venture in Arkansas involving Bill and Hillary Clinton.
The investigation culminated in the Democratic president’s impeachment by the US House of Representatives in 1998. Clinton was acquitted by the Senate.
Dershowitz is a retired Harvard University law professor and constitutional law expert whose past celebrity clients have also included boxer Mike Tyson.
“I agreed to do it as an independent constitutional scholar,” Dershowitz said. “I take no position on the politics – just on the constitution.”
Dershowitz said in a statement that he had also opposed Clinton’s impeachment, and voted for Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election.
Former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi has also been asked to join the team.
Bondi, a longtime Trump ally, joined the White House communications team last November to focus on “proactive impeachment messaging”.
The president’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani, a central figure in the Ukraine investigation, had also hoped to join the defence, but he did not make the cut.
Trump was impeached by the US House of Representatives last month on charges of abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
Democrats have accused him of withholding military aid to Ukraine to pressure the country into investigating his political rival, former US Vice-President Joe Biden.
Trump denies the claims, and calls the impeachment proceedings a partisan “hoax”.
The Republican president now faces a trial in the Senate, which must decide whether to remove him from office.
As his Republican party holds a majority in the upper chamber, he is expected to be acquitted. — NNN-AGENCIES