gregg jarrett, and, you know, i want answers from the senate. the federal rules regarding hearsay are clear. i would imagine they should apply in the senate if it ever gets over there. that s number one. number two, i would say that the constitution is pretty clear about facing your accuser, isn t it? it absolutely is, sixth amendment. you are absolutely right. the sixth amendment protects against hearsay. if you have a witness who gets up on the stand and is simply repeating what he heard from somebody else, you are depriving the accused of the ability to confront, under the sixth amendment, the original source.i so, it s unconstitutional, which is why we have the hearsay rule. so if mitch mcconnell actually invokes the federalll rules of evidence, this chattering class of diplomats won t even be allowed to testify because all they have is rank hearsay and conjecture.
gregg jarrett and, you know, i want answers from the senate. the federal rules, regarding hearsay are clear. i would imagine they should apply in the senate if it ever gets over there. that s number one. number two, i would say that the constitution is pretty clear about facing your accuser, isn t it? it absolutely is sixth amendment. you are absolutely right. the sixth amendment protects against hearsay. if you have a witness who gets up on the stand and is simply repeating what he heard from somebody else, you are depriving the accused of the ability to confront, under the sixth amendment, the original source. so, it s unconstitutional, which is why we have the hearsay rule. so if mitch mcconnell actually invokes the federal rules of evidence, this chattering class of diplomats won t even be allowed to testify because all they have is rank hearsay and conjecture.
there s another exception that s critical here and i don t think impeachment can handle all of it. we aas a rule athese people involved in a conspiracy, and there s an exception to the hearsay rule for people who are in criminal agreement and they all are making statements and furtherance of that agreement, con spear toirl statements, they re hearsay and they re admissible. most of the things we ve heard, it shows two things. they don t have any idea what hearsay is and what s admissible although that s what they write the laws about, and maybe they re just trying to be ignorant to the public saying that s just hearsay, i don t know what that means. what it means is we have the strongest case against any president facing impeachment effort with real time evidence of the crime and admissions given to our attention even as they try to prevent us from knowing the evidence they have. it s ironic they say you have this hearsay when they re concealing the other witnesses who have direct test
margaret, your view? the details of this call i think for about five people at the table, it wasn t hearsay because ambassador sondland held the phone away from his ear because trump was speaking to loudly. that violates so many security rules. but aside from that, it means that everyone heard it at the table. so, there are a number of other people that can be called. and the hearsay obstructiojectie are more objections to the hearsay rule than there are rules to follow so it s not a good argument and he s of course depriving democrats of any of the first-hand witnesses. maya? yeah, absolutely. you know, donald trump, one of the articles of impeachment he s facing is obstruction, and obstruction of congress is exactly why on one hand republicans and donald trump are saying hearsay, hearsay, all you have is hearsay.
would, obviously, be more direct evidence. as far as the rules of evidence, they are not going to apply in proceedings like this. but the federal rules of evidence which i m sure don knows so much about, create 23 exceptions to the hearsay rule. so, obviously, the courts understand just how credible it is. in the final analysis, it s how credible it is. yesterday s testimony, often secondhand, was as credible as it comes. we know from experience in criminal courts that sometimes direct evidence, something like an eyewitness testimony, can be extraordinarily faulty. but we also know that what we might think of as hearsay, indirect evidence, the exceptions might be an excited utterance or statement against an interest. we ve learned from time time and time again just how credible it can be. it s not that one is necessarily better than the other.