Impeachment trial to pause for Shabbat after Trump’s lawyer requests accommodation

The impeachment trial for Donald Trump will pause for Shabbat, after the former US president’s lawyer requested accommodations for his religious observance.

David Schoen, the Orthodox attorney leading Trump’s defense, has asked for the trial to be paused for the duration of the Jewish day of rest, which begins this coming Friday in Washington, DC, at 5:24 p.m. and lasts for 25 hours.

A spokesman for US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, who is also Jewish, tells CNN that Schoen’s team requested that the trial, which is set to begin Tuesday, be paused on Friday afternoon and resume Sunday.

“We respect their request and of course will accommodate it. Conversations with the relevant parties about the structure of the trial continue,” says the spokesman, Justin Goodman.

Trump is fighting an incitement charge in connection with the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol. The former president denies inciting his supporters, who had gathered to protest the election results, to storm the Capitol building, in a riot that resulted in five deaths.

The trial is Trump’s second. His first took place over multiple weeks in 2020, ending with his acquittal on February 5.