Senators lob loaded questions

WASHINGTON—Chief Justice John Roberts read senators’ questions for the prosecution and defense teams in President Donald Trump’s impeachment trial on Wednesday. The teams had five minutes to answer each question during the marathon 10-hour session.

What kinds of questions did the senators ask? Roberts rejected a question by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., that would have named the whistleblower whose report about Ukraine sparked the impeachment inquiry. Republican Sens. Mitt Romney of Utah, Susan Collins of Maine, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska asked Trump’s team how they should vote if they think the president had personal and political motives for his actions toward Ukraine. Trump lawyer Patrick Philbin said a president could not be removed from office for a “mixed-motive situation”: “There’s always some personal interest in the electoral outcome of policy decisions, and there’s nothing wrong with that.”

Democrats threw softball questions at the prosecution, asking how Congress’ power would weaken if it failed to remove the president. They also asked whether Trump pursued any investigations against the Biden family before former Vice President Joe Biden entered the 2020 presidential campaign. The president’s lawyers said they didn’t know of any.

Dig deeper: Read more about what the senators asked in this roundup by Politico.