Trump’s Senate trial begins

WASHINGTON: The historic impeachment trial of Donald Trump started on Tuesday with arguments focused on its constitutionality, amid expectations he would be acquitted.

Trump is the only US president to have been impeached twice, and the first ever to stand Senate trial after leaving office. He is charged with inciting supporters to storm the US Capitol on January 6 that left five people, including a police officer, dead.

House impeachment managers and Trump’s defence team are to argue the constitutionality of the trial for four hours each. The 100 senators - in their role as jurors in the trial - will vote to decide if the trial is constitutional. They are expected to say it is, as they had once before with all 50 Democrats joined by some Republicans.

Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont, who is president pro tempore of the Senate, will preside over the sessions.

Trump’s lawyers Bruce L Castor and David Schoen have called the trial unconstitutional, arguing “the Senate lacks jurisdiction to remove from office a man who does not hold office”.

House impeachment managers - all nine Democrats - have said Trump “has no valid excuse or defense for his actions”.

There might be more trouble in store for the former president. Georgia has started an inquiry into a phone call made by Trump to secretary of state Brad Raffensperger on January 2, asking him to “find” him the votes needed to overturn his November 3 election defeat in the state to Joe Biden.

“All I want to do is this: I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state,” Trump had told him.