Trump impeachment trial live updates: Biden says charge 'not in dispute' in 1st comments on acquittal

Lead House impeachment manager Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., continued the argument that Trump's rhetoric is not under blanket protection from the First Amendment and further, that this trial is "not a free speech question."

"The First Amendment does not create some superpower immunity from impeachment for a president who attacks the Constitution in word and deed, while rejecting the outcome of an election he happened to lose," Raskin said. "If anything, President Trump's conduct was an assault on the First Amendment and equal protection rights that millions of Americans exercised when they voted last year, often under extraordinarily difficult and arduous circumstances."

Raskin went on to argue the United States "wouldn't have free speech or any other rights if we didn't have the rule of law, peaceful transfer of power, and a democracy where the outcome of the election is accepted by the candidate who lost."

"We had it all the way up until 2020," Raskin added, hitting the point that Trump is the first president to not acknowledge the power of his successor.

Preemptively striking against arguments of free speech Raskin -- as he did on Wednesday -- said Trump's behavior "is not even close to the proverbial citizen who falsely shouts 'fire' in a crowded theater."

"He is like the now proverbial municipal fire chief who incites a mob to go set the theater on fire, and not only refuses to put out the fire, but encourages the mob to keep going as the blaze spreads," Raskin said. "We would hold that fire chief accountable. We would forbid him from that job ever again. And that's exactly what must happen here."

House manager Rep. Joe Neguse, D-Colo., refuted arguments proposed by Trump's legal defense that Trump's speech was free political speech protected by the First Amendment. Neguse argued that Trump's free speech defense does not align with the facts of the events.

"To hear his lawyers tell it, he was just some guy at a rally expressing unpopular opinions," Neguse said. "They would have you believe that this whole impeachment is because he said things that one may disagree with."

Neguse also argued that free speech does not protect against insurrection, and that not holding Trump accountable would be a dangerous precedent for Congress to set.

"No president, no matter their politics or the politics of their followers, conservative, liberal, or anything else, no president can do what President Trump did. Because this isn't about politics. It's about his refusal to accept the outcome of the election and his decision to incite an insurrection. And there's no serious argument that the First Amendment protects that," Neguse said. "And it would be extraordinarily dangerous for the United States Senate to conclude otherwise."

Following a break, Rep. Joaquin Castro, D-Texas, returned to the Senate floor to address the harm he said was inflicted upon American national security on Jan. 6 and the longstanding damage to the country's international standing.

"Every foreign adversary considering attacking this building got to watch a dress rehearsal, and they saw that this Capitol could be overtaken," Castro said.

He then played a video of Republican Sen. Marco Rubio on Fox News saying the riot exposed a huge vulnerability on buildings across the U.S. government. Rubio said in the clip, "You are sitting out there watching this, you are saying it's not that hard to get into the Capitol and maybe it's not hard to get into the White House or somewhere else."

Castro also played video of rioters ransacking the desks that senators are currently sitting at in the chamber -- taking confidential information and screaming inside the Senate chamber, "Let's vote on s---!"

He said Trump has handed the Chinese government "an opening to create a false equivalency between Hong Kongers protesting for democracy and violent insurrectionists trying to overthrow it."

"To convict Donald Trump would mean that America stands the rule of law no matter who violates it. Let us show the world that Jan. 6, was not America. And let us remind the world that we are truly their North Star," Castro said.

ABC News Congressional Correspondent Rachel Scott discussed how inside the chamber, nearly 15 seats of GOP senators were empty as Democratic House managers made their case against Trump.

"You have some Republicans who appear to already have their minds made up," Scott said.

In order to convict the former president, every Democratic senator and 17 Republicans would have to vote in favor. ABC News' Chief Legal Analyst Dan Abrams said that to change the minds of some Republican senators, it might require a witness who offers something "game-changing."

"Unless they've got a witness who can really offer something that is game-changing, something where someone says 'Donald Trump did or didn't do this on or around January 6th,' I don't think it's a real chance that that's going to happen," Abrams said.