Senators vote to proceed with Trump's impeachment trial, but conviction may prove elusive
- A divided U.S. Senate voted largely along party lines yesterday to move ahead with Donald Trump's impeachment trial on a charge of inciting the deadly assault on the Capitol, but conviction appears unlikely barring a major shift among Republicans.
The Senate voted 56-44 to proceed to the first-ever trial of a former president, rejecting his defense lawyers' argument that Trump was beyond the reach of the Senate after having left the White House on Jan. 20.
Democrats hope to disqualify Trump from ever again holding public office, but Tuesday's outcome suggested they face long odds. Only six Republican senators joined Democrats to vote in favor of allowing the trial to take place, far short of the 17 needed to secure a conviction.
Convicting Trump would require a two-thirds majority in the 50-50 Senate.
The vote capped a dramatic day in the Senate chamber. Democratic lawmakers serving as prosecutors opened the trial with a graphic video interspersing images of the Jan. 6 Capitol violence with clips of Trump's incendiary speech to a crowd of supporters moments earlier urging them to "fight like hell" to overturn his Nov. 3 election defeat.
Senators, serving as jurors, watched as screens showed Trump's followers throwing down barriers and hitting police officers at the Capitol. The video included the moment when police guarding the House of Representatives chamber fatally shot protester Ashli Babbitt, one of five people including a police officer who died in the rampage.
The mob attacked police, sent lawmakers scrambling for safety and interrupted the formal congressional certification of President Joe Biden's victory after Trump had spent two months challenging the election results based on false claims of widespread voting fraud.
"If that's not an impeachment offense, then there is no such thing," Democratic Representative Jamie Raskin, who led a team of nine House members prosecuting the case, told the assembled senators after showing the video.
He wept as he recounted how relatives he brought to the Capitol that day to witness the election certification had to shelter in an office near the House floor, saying: "They thought they were going to die."
In contrast to the Democrats' emotional presentation, Trump's lawyers attacked the process, arguing that the proceeding was an unconstitutional, partisan effort to close off Trump's political future even after he had already departed the White House.
"What they really want to accomplish here in the name of the Constitution is to bar Donald Trump from ever running for political office again, but this is an affront to the Constitution no matter who they target today," David Schoen, one of Trump's lawyers, told senators.
He denounced the "insatiable lust for impeachment" among Democrats before airing his own video, which stitched together clips of various Democratic lawmakers calling for Trump's impeachment going back to 2017.
Dear Editor,
We the undersigned Commissioners wish to disassociate ourselves from a letter dated January 28, 2021, emanating from the Ethnic Relations Commission (ERC) as signed by the Chairman and addressed to the Honourable Catherine Hughes, Member of Parliament.
The letter followed the completion of an internal investigation into a Facebook post in which the comment, “this country needs a civil war”, was noted. The Commission in a press release on December 16, 2020, captioned, “ERC INVESTIGATING DANGEROUS SOCIAL MEDIA POST ALLEGEDLY ATTRIBUTED TO CATHY HUGHES”, captured Ms. Hughes’ response and further stated that, “the Commission will continue its investigation to first ascertain the authenticity of the post and then decide on any action that may be deemed necessary”.
In our respectful opinions, we have always argued in the Commission that any action and/or utterances by anyone, especially public officials, which can lead to disharmony, is of concern to the body. A civil war is a war between citizens of the same country and can have dire consequences as history teaches. Therefore, in our view, calls for such, whether allegedly by Mrs. Hughes or anyone else, have the potential to bring direct harm and disharmony to and among our people.
The letter to Mrs. Hughes alluded to, which did not address the authenticity of the post, did not benefit from our input as Commissioners. Indeed, we were only made aware of it after it was prepared and dispatched. Therefore, the missive does not reflect our views on the issue it speaks to.
The “raison d’etre” of the Ethnic Relations Commission (ERC) is to investigate comments that can lead to or excite racial and ethnic hostility between and among Guyanese.
Our view is that the position adopted by the Commission in the said letter, constitutes an abysmal abdication of its very mandate. Further, while space may not permit, a number of statements of similar genus, which were the subject of investigation, commentary and condemnation by this Commission in the past, can be cited.
Therefore, it remains befuddling that the Commission takes the position that the comment made in the alleged post, is beyond its scope to pronounce upon, yet and in the very next sentence, it seemingly pronounces on the matter and then later on proceeds to issue an apology to
Mrs. Hughes.
For ease of reference, paragraph three (3) from the letter states, “As you are aware, the mandate of the Commission is to receive and investigate complaints of racial, ethnic, religious or cultural discrimination brought to its attention. Hence, the complaint falls outside the scope of the Commission. The team has concluded that the comment, ‘this country needs a civil war’, was intended to create nothing more than mischief in the Guyanese populace”.
By concluding in that paragraph, that the comment was intended to create nothing more than mischief, the matter, in our view, has been pronounced upon by the Commission – a matter, by its own position, that has the potential for disharmony.
The situation is further compounded by the decision to recommend the said matter for investigation elsewhere thereby recognizing that the matter is far from completed. In doing so, the Commission is claiming that it has no jurisdiction over the said matter.
We are also befuddled that, from the conclusion, such a dastardly call as that for a civil war, whether through an alleged doctored post or one facilitated supposedly through a
fake profile, seems not of concern to the Commission.
We believe that with all due respect to Mrs. Hughes whom we have nothing personally against, there wasn’t a need for the Commission to apologize especially since the Commission did not accuse her of an offence.
Given that the apology emanated from the Commission, we believe it was necessary for our views to be made public to avoid any misconception that the decision was holistic.
Inexplicably, the Commission, having issued a statement on January 19, 2021, captioned, “ERC TO INVESTIGATE INTERNAL BREACH OF PRIVATE MEETING”, and which was in response to racial attacks against us and two other Commissioners simply because we voted for external advertisement for vacancies at the level of the Heads of Department, to date, we are yet to be officially informed, verbally or written, on the said investigation. That could be subjected to inferences.