Trump’s impeachment trial ‘could dog the start of the Biden presidency’
President-elect wants to prioritise economy, Covid jabs and Cabinet
THE second impeachment of Donald Trump for inciting last week’s deadly rampage at the Capitol could set off a bitter Senate fight that entangles the early days of his successor Joe Biden’s term.
Mr Trump became the first president in US history to be impeached twice when the House voted 232-197 on Wednesday to charge him with inciting the riot. Ten of Mr Trump’s fellow Republicans joined Democrats in approving the article of impeachment.
But the swift impeachment is unlikely to lead to Mr Trump’s removal before president-elect Mr Biden takes office on January 20.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican, rejected Democratic calls for a quick impeachment trial, saying there was no way to finish it before Mr Trump leaves office.
That raised the prospect of a bitter trial in the Senate during Mr Biden’s first days in the White House, something he urged Senate leaders to avoid.
Mr Biden said work on the economy, getting the Covid vaccine programme on track and confirming crucial Cabinet posts was too crucial to delay. “I hope that the Senate leadership will find a way to deal with their Constitutional responsibilities on impeachment while also working on the other urgent business of this nation,” Mr Biden said.
The House passed one article of impeachment – equivalent to an indictment in a criminal trial – accusing Mr Trump of “incitement of insurrection” over an incendiary speech he delivered to thousands of supporters shortly before the riot.
In the speech, Mr Trump had repeated false claims that the election was fraudulent and exhorted supporters to march
on the Capitol.
The mob disrupted Congress’s certification of Mr Biden’s victory over Mr Trump in the November 3 election, sent lawmakers into hiding and left five people dead, including a police officer.
Under the Constitution, impeachment in the House triggers a trial in the Senate. A two-thirds majority would be needed to convict and remove Mr Trump, meaning at least 17 Republicans in the 100member chamber would have to join the Democrats.
Even if Mr Trump is already out of the White House, conviction in the Senate could lead to a vote banning him from running again.
Mr McConnell has said no trial could begin until the Senate was scheduled to be back in regular session on next Tuesday, the day before Biden’s inauguration.
Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer, set to become majority leader this month, said that no matter the timing, “there will be an impeachment trial in the United States Senate; there will be a vote on convicting the president for high crimes and misdemeanors; and if the president is convicted, there will be a vote on barring him from running again.”
House leaders did not say when they would send the charge to the Senate for consideration.
Asked if it would be a good idea to hold a trial on Mr Biden’s first day in office, Representative Madeleine Dean, one of the House members who will prosecute the trial, said: “I don’t want to preview it, but certainly not. We have a president and a vice president to swear in, we have to restore the peaceful transfer of power, which Donald Trump deliberately incited violence against.”
With the National Guard standing watch, the emotional impeachment debate unfolded in the same House chamber where lawmakers had ducked under chairs and donned gas masks on January 6 as rioters clashed with police outside the doors.
“The president of the United States incited this insurrection, this armed rebellion against our common country,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a Democrat, said on the House floor before the vote. “He must go. He is a clear and present danger to the nation that we all love.”
At a later ceremony, she signed the article of impeachment before, saying she did this “sadly, with a heart broken over what this means to our country”.
No US president has ever been removed from office. Three – Mr Trump in 2019, Bill Clinton in 1998 and Andrew Johnson in 1868 – were impeached by the House but acquitted by the Senate. Richard Nixon resigned in 1974 rather than face impeachment.
In a video statement released after Wednesday’s vote, Mr Trump did not mention impeachment and took no responsibility for his remarks to supporters last week, but condemned the violence.