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Good morning. I'm Anna Palmer.

And I'm Jake Sherman.

And welcome to The Daily Punch.

Brought to you by Punch Bowl News.

It's Friday, February 12th, 2021.

Let's get into the mix. Here are your Washington headlines of the day. Number one, Trump's defense lawyers take the wheel at the impeachment trial.

Number two, how the Biden administration is trying to ignore it. And number three, the latest on Senate

Democrats strategy on COVID relief. All right, Jake, let's get into the mix here. Trump's defense

lawyers are taking the wheel from Democrats. Obviously, they closed strong last night. Pretty powerful

and convincing argument. I think a lot of people would say,

even if, you know, Republicans aren't going to vote to convict Trump, a lot of people, I think,

believe that the Democrats did a good job. It's a pretty high hurdle that this Trump defense team

kind of has to climb here. And a hurdle they're not going to reach, Anna, because the defense team has really no good

arguments compared to the, to the prosecution.

Bruce Castor and David Chon have largely and widely been seen as subpar compared to the

House Democratic impeachment managers.

They're still complaining that this is not a trial.

...