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

During the recess, ABC News Senior National Correspondent Terry Moran noted that "the table's turned" during Trump's defense presentation.

"It is really what our partisan politics are all about right now," Moran said. "It is less about what you believe than who you hate."

As a part of the defense, Trump's lawyers showed clips of videos of Democrats using fighting language during their own political speeches, drawing a comparison to the former president.

"Counter attacking with what about-ism is basically what partisan politics has come to in the United States," Moran continued.

ABC News Chief Washington Correspondent, Jonathan Karl said this defense was considerably more effective due to the audience of the trial and who needs to be swayed, mainly Republican senators.

"They put it back very much on a partisan line, describing this as a political act of vengeance -- this impeachment trial -- and playing all those Democrats saying things that could be seen as incendiary," Karl said.

The Senate has returned from a roughly 40-minute break to resume arguments from Trump's defense team.

As Trump's lawyers get their defense presentation underway, ABC News White House Correspondent MaryAlice Parks asked White House press secretary Jen Psaki what message she thinks Americans should have learned from the Senate trial this week. 

Psaki said that Americans "learned about the power of some individuals in the House they might not have known before," perhaps referring to Del. Stacey Plaskett, D-Virgin Islands, who had a strong presentation that prompted chatter that she is a rising Democratic star. 

"They certainly saw some -- some powerful footage that was a reminder of the shocking events that happened on January 6th. And you know, I think they saw, as the president has said, that that day was an assault on our democracy and it was a reminder of why it can never happen again," Psaki continued.

-ABC News' Sarah Kolinovsky

Trump defense attorney Michael van der Veen broke down Brandenburg v. Ohio, a case House managers raised Thursday. Van der Veen cited the "landmark case on the issue of incitement speech" to argue that Trump didn't intend for supporters to attack the Capitol.

A displayed slide read that the Brandenburg test "precludes speech from being sanctioned as incitement to riot unless: 1) the speech explicitly or implicity encouraged use of violence or lawless action, 2) the speaker intends that his speech will result in use of violence of lawless action and 3) the imminent use of violence or lawless action is likely to result from the speech."

He called Trump's uses of the words "fight" in the speech "metaphorical." However, he did not address the impeachment managers' assertions that Trump had primed his supporters with a "big lie" of a stolen election.

"Spare us the hypocrisy and false indignation. It's a term used over and over and over again by politicians on both sides of the aisle," van der Veen said, honing in on arguments of "whataboutisms" of Democrats.

"The reality is Mr. Trump was not in any way shape or form instructing these people to fight or to use physical violence. What he was instructing them to do was to challenge their opponents in primary elections to push for sweeping election reforms, to hold big tech responsible," he said.

However, at least 15 individuals who stormed the building have since said that they acted based on Trump's encouragement, including some of those accused of the most violent and serious crimes. House managers also argued in their time that Trump's oath of office to protect the country supersedes his First Amendment rights.

Trump's defense team has also played extended video of Trump's speech at the Jan. 6 rally, in which the former president repeated false claims that the election was stolen and encouraged Republican lawmakers to vote to overturn the Electoral College results.