Washington - Donald Trump was on Wednesday night branded a "despot" who tried to cheat to win an election as the case against him was set out at his impeachment trial.
Lead Democratic prosecutor Adam Schiff accused the US President of setting up a corrupt scheme to put pressure on Ukraine to help him win the race for the White House in November.
Mr Schiff began his address to the Senate by quoting one of America’s Founding Fathers, Alexander Hamilton, on the need for impeachment as a mechanism to remove a "despot" from office.
He said Mr Trump had pushed Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy to investigate former vice-president Joe Biden, a candidate in the White House race, and his son on unsubstantiated corruption charges last year.
He accused Mr Trump of applying pressure on Ukraine by withholding military aid "to improve his re-election prospects at home… in other words, to cheat".
Mr Schiff said the question the Senate faced was whether Mr Trump should be removed "because he abused his office and the public trust by using his power for personal gain". He added: "If this conduct is not impeachable, then nothing is."
He said that if Mr Trump was not removed, future presidents would be invited "to operate as if they too are also beyond the reach of accountability, congressional oversight and the law".
%%%twitter https://twitter.com/hashtag/ImpeachmentTrial?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#ImpeachmentTrial pic.twitter.com/5HBbe16cZf
— PoliticusUSA (@politicususa)
Mr Trump, who denies any wrongdoing, said on Wednesday he would ‘love’ to attend his own trial in Washington but his lawyers will not let him.
He arrived back in the US on Wednesday night from a trip to the Davos business summit in Switzerland, just in time to hear the case against him open in the Senate.
Known for his commentaries on Twitter, he remained silent for the much of the first day of proceedings on Tuesday.
But 11 hours in to a mammoth 13-hour sitting, as the clock struck midnight in the Senate – 6am in Switzerland – the President posted 40 messages in 40 minutes, retweeting support from allies or attacks on the Democrats.
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