the u.s. reporting just over 97,000 hospitalizations on saturday. but the numbers of course are still grim overall. the u.s. has now surpassed 26 million confirmed infections since the pandemic started and of course leads the world in its numbers of cases. this was extraordinary. anti-vaccination protesters in los angeles on saturday. another reminder that some people oppose covid-19 vaccination efforts even as case numbers rise around the globe. there were some reports the protesters temporarily halted operations at the dodger stadium vaccination site. but the los angeles police department says that s not the case. and in the world of politics former president donald trump s five impeachment defense attorneys have stepped aside with little more than a week before that senate trial is set to begin. sources familiar with the matter tell cnn the lawyers pulled out amid a disagreement over his legal strategy. let s talk more about this surprising development in the impeachment c
lawyers leaving. within a couple of hours, it was an exodus, five of them gone. the trial s a week away, where does this leave the defense? it s a disaster for the defense. five is all that there are. it s not simply that they open a week from tuesday. he has briefs due with his basic legal position on tuesday. it s inconceivable to me that he could get any kind of halfway professional lawyer and get together his basic claim to submit by tuesday, especially since he seems to be insisting on staying the course with the sort of big lie fraud claim that actually was the source of the problem in the first place. it was his sort of insistence and at all costs clinging to this claim that s led to the insurrection here. if he were to go in it would be the ultimate leading with his chin. now that all his lawyers have deserted him, i don t know what any litigant, let alone the former president in an impeachment trial, is to do 72 hours from when he has to state his legal position.